In This House, We Believe… What Exactly?

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Recently, I put up a post about the Cowboy Code of Ethics asking you all if you would accept it as it, modify it in some way, or do some completely other thing. Then I needed to look up the wording for signs I see around our neighborhood starting out with “In this house, we believe…” with a list containing phrases such as Black Lives Matter, Women’s Rights are Human Rights, No Human is Illegal, Science is Real… often ending with “Kindness is Everything.” Not exactly a code of ethics, but an interesting exercise none the less.

In the process of looking for that sign, I discovered that people with other ideas had adopted their own versions of this list. I found one that read: Biden Stole the Election; Fauci Can’t Be Trusted; Bill Gates Isn’t a Doctor; Hillary Belongs in Prison; Epstein Didn’t Kill Himself; Media is Propaganda. So, OK. That’s them. 

Then I opened a Substack post in which the author had created her own list. Here’s what Jenny Holland writes:

In this Substack, we believe

  • Tucker Carlson is the most perceptive, intelligent broadcaster today
  • Donald Trump is far less corrupt and dangerous than Joe Biden
  • Steve Bannon is just a Reagan Democrat, not the second coming of Joseph Goebbels
  • MAGA is the the 21st version of the early 20th century labour movement, not the Brown Shirts
  • Anti-vaxxers are probably right about everything
  • Conspiracy theorists should be listened to
  • Traditional Catholics are not domestic terrorists
  • Muslim parents are right to protest LGBT lessons in schools
  • January 6 was a fed-surrection
  • Giorgia Meloni is the most interesting politician in Europe and the left is angry because she sounds more left-wing than they do
  • Viktor Orban is correct about protecting traditional Christian values

I responded to this post by explaining what I agreed with and what I disagreed with. The author was kind enough to reply saying she thought I wasn’t hopeless. 

So, dear readers, what would we agree on if we were to come up with our own version of “In this house, we believe…” I will start, and probably not finish, this task expanding on my thinking on some of them. Feel free to challenge me on any of them.

In this house, we believe:

  • All lives matter.
  • Doubt is essential.
  • Fairness is fine, but don’t expect that you’ll get it.
  • Schadenfreude is acceptable once in a while.
  • Western medicine is capable of good things, but a little humility would be good for all. (I survived pneumonia as a kid with the help of penicillin; I’m alive with the help of a pacemaker today.)
  • The health of my community sometimes requires sacrifices on my part.
  • The concept of “My Truth” is BS, though “The Truth” is often elusive.
  • We all act based on our hopes and fears. Understanding other people’s hopes and fears might help heal some of our divisions. We could, at least, have better conversations.

Regarding the first of these, “all lives matter,” I honestly, truthfully, deep, deep down, believe that if we are not safe to say that all lives matter, we cannot heal our divisions. Saying this does not erase our history, but if we cannot respect each other enough to say that their life matters just as our own life matters, then we cannot get to square one in solving anything.

Regarding doubt, we obviously need to accept some things as provisionally true in order to get out of bed in the morning and do anything at all. But we should also be willing to entertain new information and change our minds when something persuasive comes along. It’s becoming really, truly hard to know what’s right and what’s wrong, but doing nothing is not an option, just as picking a side and sticking with it no matter what is also not an option. 

Western medicine, aka Big Pharma, drives me crazy with their ridiculous propensity to take advantage of patents, their ability to flood any legislative body with lobbyists, and their ability to present cherry-picked information to doctors along with steak dinners and cocktails. Is the answer public funding of all research? I doubt it. Better oversight by a more independent FDA? Perhaps. Whatever the case, we need to address this. AND other forms of coziness between physicians and services such as labs, imaging, and other equipment providers.

Public health has been targeted since Covid lockdowns, vaccine mandates, and masking school kids. But it’s essential. So many of the improvements in life expectancy over the past 200 years are due to public health efforts. We can’t allow this service to be undermined.

“My Truth:” Give me a break. Yes, your experience has shaped your thinking, but no, you do not have “Your Truth.” You have your thoughts based on your experiences. Actual truth is what we can agree on after testing it in a series of back and forth challenges. And even then, it’s provisional until somewhere down the line, new information upends our current understanding. 

My brain is now maxed out for the day. Time for you to argue with me!

About That Code of Ethics…

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The reason I featured that particular “code of ethics” (see my May 25 post) for discussion is because it so starkly contrasts with other guidance we get nowadays. I’m thinking of “centering” guidance, such as “We will center racism…” or whatever other ism is in the headlines. I stumbled across the “Live each day with courage…” code when I was browsing news about Wyoming, my home state. I do that periodically, just to see what that broad empty expanse of the Wild West is up to today.

In my most recent exploration of all things Wyoming, I discovered that the Code of the West was adopted in 2010 as the Official State Code of Wyoming. The one thing I changed in my recent post was the “Work for the team” line which was originally “Ride for the brand.” I just figured that “Ride for the brand” would give too much away, and I wanted it to come to you in a neutral way.

This code is being used in schools across the state, and I have to say that prefer it to all of the various diversity, equity, inclusion guidance that kids get in many schools today. I would quibble with lots of it based on experience derived from my advancing age. For example: “Always finish what you start.” Ha. A year ago, as part of my ongoing downsizing effort, I officially gave up on a variety of knitting projects, some of which were fairly close to completion. I’d had them sitting around, some for years, waiting for a bit of advice, time, or that feeling of optimism I had when I started them. They only induced guilt each time I looked at them until I finally said to myself, “This is ridiculous. Perhaps someone will make use of this yarn. Get these out of here!” And yes, I’m glad I did that.

One bit of the code I do like is this one: “Talk less. Say more.” For me, it’s missing a bit in the middle, namely “Listen first.” I really am committed to doing a lot more listening lately, and I am learning some valuable things. I’d do other editing before adopting the code as is, but if a state is going to give guidance in this day and age, I rather they use this code than, say, the Ten Commandments, or “Look for racism everywhere all the time,” or other admonitions that pass for good advice today.

If you were searching for advice that schools could adopt, would you start from scratch, edit something like this, or forego the exercise altogether? Years ago, I substituted in a 4th grade classroom that had this for a motto: “It’s nice to be important, but it’s more important to be nice.” It was a great class, but perhaps it was because the teacher just led the kids in a supportive, but patient way. Perhaps it wasn’t just the motto. Whatever the case, I do think it might be worthwhile to think through our values now and then. Have they changed? Do they need to be updated? Have world events or personal experience affected how we see things?

Hmm.

Would This Code of Ethics Work for You?

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Let’s imagine that your local school district develops a code of ethics to guide staff, students, and the community. It contains the following bits of guidance. Would this meet with your approval? Yes? No? Why or why not?

Seriously, folks, I’d love to hear your responses to this code. (Note: I’m rewording one so as not to make the source so obvious. I’ll share it when I discuss the source of this code tomorrow.)

Here we go:

Live each day with courage.

Take pride in your work.

Always finish what you start.

Do what has to be done.

Be tough, but fair.

When you make a promise, keep it.

Work for the team.

Talk less and say more.

Remember some things aren’t for sale.

Know where to draw the line.

You can scratch some out, edit, add to it, whatever you’d like to do to make this work for you. Have at it. I’ll share my thoughts tomorrow.

People Are Opting Out

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People are opting out. Of life. I wonder why. Can we blame it all on Covid? No, I don’t think so. Yes, I think Covid threw a monkey wrench into life as we knew it. But if it hadn’t been Covid, I think it would have been something else.

For sure, the interruption to our social life is having an impact. Not feeling comfortable eating out in a busy, popular cafe is truly a downer. And I heard today that after a large, maskless meeting of CDC employees last week, 35 of them soon came down with Covid. So masking up in big groups or small rooms is tedious, but that hasn’t pushed me over the edge.

Everyone has a tipping point, and I felt like I reached mine last week. I was across the street for an eye exam and noticed that the very convenient, very helpful eye-ware shop was shuttered. Grrr, I thought. Decisions from much higher up, I was told. (Much higher up, in this case, means the bosses of the very large Catholic institution that now runs the show.)

But that wasn’t what did me in. Rather it was the discovery a few days later that the hospital gift shop was also being closed. WTF? Do the bishops disapprove of shopping? Do they not know that shopping is therapy? Do they not know that patients’ families need a distraction? Do they not know that we all need a treat or a magazine or a card for someone now and then? The gift shop was run by volunteers with about a half of a staff position or less doing oversight. WTF, indeed! 

Perhaps I could survive the loss of these two very handy businesses if they weren’t coming on top of the loss of Macy’s, Columbia Sportswear, Bed, Bath and Beyond, Chico’s, the neighborhood branch of our bank, a bunch of retail at Pacific Place, the pharmacy next to Gelatiamo, and retailers that I never patronized, but other people did and they helped keep downtown alive. 

Supposedly, there are more people downtown this week because Amazon said to show up at the office or else. Perhaps that means something now that even the Amazons of the world are laying people off. Granted, the people who work at Amazon don’t exactly support my kind of retail, but somehow they help the world look alive, even in their nerdy zombie state. There was certainly more traffic today when I managed to run two errands during morning and evening rush hours by mistake. Note to self: avoid rush hours again!

I don’t think the lack of shopping options is the primary factor leading to the deep pessimism that I and others are feeling. It’s pretty easy to thump the table and grumble at the loss of a gift shop, but I’m confident that the pessimism derives from more serious problems. Such as the wildly dysfunctional national government, the wildly stupid extremes of the culture wars, the wildly ridiculous length of being on hold for answers to the simplest of questions. And construction, still going on everywhere! And the transit interruptions, and the absence of oatmeal in the Bistro, and  the impossible wait times for elevator repairs, and the endless timelines for  “corridor refurbishment,” and the incomplete remodel of our main meeting room such that the audio doesn’t work on one day and the lighting doesn’t work on another day, and no, the drapes are not here yet.

Nothing ever gets finished. The finish line might as well not exist: no one will ever get to it. 

Hence pessimism. For older folks such as myself, this is taking a toll. You know things are bad when people are opting to end their lives by VSED – that’s “Voluntarily Stopping Eating and Drinking” to you youngsters out there. It is not an easy way to die. But guns are not allowed in my retirement community. Frankly, I’d buy a gun and break that rule before starving myself to death. Seriously, what are they going to do to me? Kick me out? Ha. That’s the whole point of the exercise. 

I actually am not at that degree of pessimism yet, but it is sad to see that others are. And I am well and truly frustrated with the state of the world. I’ve been well and truly frustrated for quite a while, but Ukraine just did me in, even more than the way we mucked up Covid. Could we please just enable Ukraine to win this war within my lifetime? Please! Just win it! 

Well, I live in Seattle, and our hockey team, the Kraken, are in the second round of the playoffs – in just their second year of existence. I see why some people tune out the news and tune in to sports. But then once the game is over, the corridors are still not finished, there is still no oatmeal in the Bistro, Madison Street is still a mess, and the AV system in Anderson Hall will likely never be complete. 

So we are heading out of town for a few days in eastern Washington. I don’t care if it rains or snows or we are blinded by the sun. We are outa here, folks. See ya later!

Unlearning Fear

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Tyre Nichols. Philando Castile. Two men, just trying to comply with police instructions, end up dead for no good reason. How do we put an end to this disgrace?

Some deaths at the hands of police are just wrong. Some deaths at the hands of police seem unnecessary, but investigations reveal reasons for police use of deadly force. Sometimes the police are clearly the good guys, and the bad guys are truly out of control, dangerous to the public, and need to be stopped. When any police shooting is caught on video, the only thing we know is that we don’t know the whole story.

Here are a few things we do know: people, liberals especially, vastly overestimate all killings by police and especially the killings of black men.* Black Lives Matter leaders have pushed the narrative of out of control police departments targeting black men. This narrative only increases fear of police to the point that more men resist and/or flee which only increases the risk that force, perhaps deadly force, will be used on them. 

The prevailing narrative ramps up fear to what might be an irrational level, but the deaths of Nichols and Castile illustrate that some amount of fear is rational. Many police departments are trying to train and retrain officers to interact in ways that reduce the violent and intimidating tactics we associate with anyone being arrested. The goal is for everyone to come out alive at the end. Ideally, black men would know that this is happening, understand that the goal is for everyone to chill, cooperate with police, and end up alive, either released when appropriate or working their way through a justice system that is fair to all. 

The recent death of Tyre Nichols helped me understand why fear is still rational if you’re stopped by police. The question is when is it rational to let go of rational fear, that is fear based on reasonable evidence that police just might kill you? 

We, as humans, are not that good at judging risk, yet we do it all day every day. What’s truly challenging is recalibrating our level of fear when the calculations change. Yet, we can do this. Even I, with my long-standing fear of flying, flew on four airplanes in 2022 without any white knuckles. Somehow, the safety record for flying became so compelling that I had to dial back my fear, especially when it was obvious that the only way I could get where I wanted to go was to fly. Fortunately, no recent disasters occurred that would have interfered with my new-found confidence.

This is not the case however, when it comes to interactions between police and the public, especially the black and brown public. I can only imagine the emotions that ran through police departments that were making a serious effort to alter the tone of interactions with suspects in non-violent situations. Decent cops must surely have been devastated to see the videos of the beating of Tyre Nichols. Decent black men may surely have thought that things are never going to change. 

Fear can absolutely be rational. It can also be irrational. One of the challenges young women face is learning to calibrate their level of fear to the social situations they encounter as they enter the world outside their home. (I’m skipping the fear some children learn at home for now.) We’ve all heard about “the talk” that black mothers give to their sons in hopes that they will emerge unscathed from encounters with police. Calibrate your fear. Your best bet to emerge alive is to follow instructions.

And then, Tyre Nichols. Was Nicholas an exception? Yes. But how much of an exception? Were other examples simply not filmed for our viewing? How many examples? How long will it take for young black men to begin to let go of rational fear? If deaths as senseless as those of Castile or Nicholas happen only once a year, or once every two years, or five years, it will be enough to sustain the fear that lingers. Police must intervene to stop their peers who overreact. Young black men could benefit from recalibrating their fear of police, knowing that change is happening. Dialing back the violence and the rhetoric could occur at the same time from both sides. No, the burden shouldn’t be on young black men to unlearn their fear. But the reality is that their chances of sustaining permanent injuries or being killed are low enough to take a chance on compliance. I get why everyone might disagree with me, but I hope both sides will give peace a chance. 

* Sources:

Washington Post Data Base

Roland Fryer studies of use of force

Public estimates of police use of force