Roberta M Roy

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Wednesday, January 19, 2011

Some Time-Theme Perspectives on the News

In listening to the news today, two themes related to time came to mind. The first was how history repeats itself. The second had to do with time warps.

Early this morning there was a discussion of the rise of the Neo-Nazi party in Europe, most especially in East Germany. Gives me the shivers on the one hand. Saddens me on the other. Especially on thinking back.

In the sixties, young Germans were often torn in their feelings toward their fathers. Certainly not all the men could have been on the Russian front during the years Jews and Romas and any person suspected of having other than the blue-blood of Aryans in their veins were being starved, consigned to forced labor, mistreated, and murdered in more than a thousand concentration camps, all just smaller versions of Auschwitz and Dachau. But WWII was over. Their fathers loved them. And those who chose to set aside their doubts and sense of guilt-by-association determined they would never be as their fathers had been.

And then that generation had children and while the results may have been mixed, they were not so strong as to put us on alert.

Ah. But this is 2011. We are now talking about those children's children in a time when the German economic future is imaged as threatened--if one can imagine such a feeling being possible when the German Gross Domestic Product or GDP is the 4th to 5th largest in world and the country, due to its production savy, is currently the world's second largest exporter. Yeah.

But what about all these foreigners coming in and taking away good jobs? Who cares if the brain drain caused in other countries fueled the robustness of the German economy? No. Neo-Nazism fervor rises against any group or individual found in Germany but not born of German parents.

And here once again we find ourselves someplace in the mid-20th century. Except Neo-Nazism is all shined up and spiffy. In the 2006 German elections as much as seven per cent of the vote went to Neo-Nazis at times. But now, come Saturday, in Dresden, formerly part of East Germany, Neo-Nazis plan a march. About 6,000 right-wing extremists are expected including the new spiffied-up German neo-Nazis--heads shaved and leather black jackets and boots--certainly to be on site for other than the reason they are in any way being marginalized, disenfranchised, or left to go hungry.

Meantime, here in the United States of America we find Republicans elected to the Housefor the first time in the last election scurrying to do the as they promised as they voted to repeal the Health Care Law. Why? Caught in a time warp. Still think it's last year. Still think people have not begun to understand how the Health Care Law works. Out there to represent the people. What people? People change. A legislature is supposed to be responsive to those changes. But no. They just don't notice how the see-saw is tipping the other direction. One wonders with whom among their consitutents they last discussed what was a health care bill and is now a law. And when. Yup. Still running around using strong words like job-killing--whatever that is--despite the results of more recent polls that suggest that only about 30% of the nation currently do not approve of to the Health Care Law while some 40% think it's a good idea and only one in four or five favor its repeal.

So across the Atlantic, if not prevented, history threatens to repeat itself. And here on this side of the Atlantic, Republicans and a few Democrats remain caught in some kind of a time warp where only the facts change.

As for me, I cannot help but wonder what it would take to get the facts--instead of the personally held biases and beliefs--to influence the perceptions conservative negativists on both side of the Atlantic. Lable them as you like, they stand like the proverbial ostrich with their heads in the sand.

Roberta in Po-Town--Am I missing something?

10:32 pm est Comments

Sunday, January 16, 2011

Old Letters

Recently I came upon a stash of letters written twenty years ago to me by several of my nieces and nephews. At the time, I was in Virginia, scoping out economic possibilities. It was in a year just after IBM in Poughkeepsie had downsized causing the local economy to fall to pieces.

As a result of the economic downturn, most of the men in the family who were in the building and construction trades lost their businesses or were unemployed or underemployed. This caused their wives who until that point had been stay-at-home moms to look for work in the community.

Unemployed with the rest of the men, my son used all of fifteen hundred dollars and went into business for himself, opening Gallery Ottaviani which, while it has not made him rich has continued to support him and his family through the years. In September he will celebrate his twentieth year in business. Needless to say, I'm very proud of him as it is not easy for a small business man to make it in a community that pretty much blinks at the special situation of an owner-operator one-man business. http://galleryottaviani.com/

Over the years Stef has seen some nineteen other framers in the town and city close. And if it were not for the museum quality of his work and the loyalty of his customers, he'd not have been able to remain in business. As it is, beyond being listed in the phone book, he can't afford to advertise so most of his clientele arrive in response to word-of-mouth recommendations from those he has previously served.

Meantime, as local health care and educational businesses expand, they seem to prefer to use out-of-area larger suppliers. Definitely not what it was in old days when Stef frequently would be asked to frame all the work for a new restaurant or hospital wing. What with the rising costs of framing lengths and the increased availabilty of cheap labor in parts unknown, the larger the organization the more more likely they are to know a place on Long Island or someplace south where they can get the job done more cheaply. The fact that is of lesser quality seems not to be of concern. As for commitment to supporting small local independent businesses, you can forget that.

But I digress. I was talking about letters. Old letters. Old letters, somehow related to how larger businesses evidence little concern for the needs of smaller ones for their support. And what do I mean by that?

Well, you know dinosaurs. Gone. Extinct. The same is to be said for large businesses seeking to support smaller businesses. Or people taking the time to hand write a letter, wait the week or two for a response, and then pen off an answer.

Well, here I was with twenty precious remnants of the past written by young people who then were in the lower and middle grades of primary school and now adult, with one marrying this August and all holding responsible positions and two just finishing up degrees. Reading them was like reaching back to sweetness and vulnerability and trust a level so readily lost and forgotten. My heart lifted with happiness, not only for myself but for them.

So much occurs in life. We mature and toughen. We become more careful as to how we give our love and express it. But here were these letters all overflowing with reaching out to entertain, support, and love. All enthusiasm and care. All positivity and eagerness for what was next.

And so I copied them and bundled the copies off to my niece so she too could enjoy the beauty of the simplicity of her and her siblings openness at that time. And it would seem she did, for she called me to read brief quotes and talk about the time and how difficult for everyone it had been, and how smaller things were bigger then, and how beautiful it was to have her and her brothers as niece and nephew. And how special it is now that we still talk and that we know one another not only now, but then, and through these letters, together we can drink again like thirsty deer at a watering spot from the past.

Roberta in Po-Town, Still feelin' the glow

9:28 pm est Comments

Monday, January 10, 2011

When is Equal Less than Equal?

Back in the nineteen seventies when The Women’s Movement was gathering force, women struggled to find ways both to listen and to be heard. True, the 1934 Communications act (section 315) requires radio, cable, and television stations with original programming to “treat legally qualified political candidates equally when it comes to selling or giving away air time.” But women were not running for office and from my own experience I can assure you that even in the Faculty Meetings at SUNY College at New Paltz where I was an Assistant Professor, women were also not being heard.

At that time women constituted roughly fifteen per cent of the faculty at SUC-New Paltz. Their survival was contingent on being unmarried, better than mediocre, and ‘one of the boys’. As such it was important for a woman to have great ideas—as long as she shared them with a male who spewed them forth in a timely manner. This then resulted in the male being lauded—possibly promoted, while the female, with any luck, had more deeply braided herself into the ‘boys’ circle.

However, also in the seventies, a new breed of female faculty raised its head. This breed chose to speak for herself and to be heard as herself. Viewed as an inexplicable oddity, often we stood to speak amid the shuffle of papers. Generally any faculty response would be minimal. As to actually being heard, it was pretty much out of the question.

So in women’s groups, women decided different rules would govern their discussions. The first such rule I recall was that once a woman spoke, she was not to speak again until all the other women had spoken. This had a rather calming affect as rapid exchange was out of the question. Also, not every woman had something to say. To the best of my knowledge the guideline faded without discussion and if there were any rules that remained in place they returned to something more akin to Robert’s.

Ah, but did I love the faculty debates! It was great fun and excitement to hear impassioned males as they stood to display not only the beauty of their use of words, but also their passion in relation to the topic under discussion. As such words flew around the room on wings and swords in the forms of irony, poetry, soliloquy, humor, and repartee. Equals among equals with everyone understanding how the game was played. Ah, how I loved the fun of it all--until I stood--and the room went hush. And the papers rattled.

Meantime, in the outer world, debates were taking on odder and odder shapes. Each speaker was given equal time. Each speaker was given equal time to rebut the other speaker or speakers. Emotion became a thing that only women might descend into using. Balance became the style of the day. And whatever a speaker had to say, he—almost always a he—had equal time to expound his point. It mattered not how inconsequential nor poorly supported it was. And the debates ceased to be debates. Instead they became displays of equal.

Sometimes, if one were lucky, equal equaled equal. At other times nothing equaled something—or everything. And so began the rhetoric. I believe that it was then that the ‘new rhetoric’ began--when the ideas didn’t hold together, when the research didn’t support the conclusion, when the premise of the argument stood on shards of glass, and neither logic nor compassion rang true. It was then we moved to this new rhetoric so lacking in substance.

Name-calling, for instance, became big. The use of large, empty words took precedence over reason or love of mankind. No longer was a person misled or uninformed. No. He or she became evil. And instead of reasoning with the other side there were those who would prefer to talk of targeting them in the crosshairs of their sites.

Recent events have made clear the foolishness of such talk. Those who traffic in empty rhetoric, hate- mongering, empty arguments, and manipulation of the truth must just stop it.

Yes. Let’s get back to talking turkey as the saying goes. Let’s all say what we mean and listen to what is said and stop shuffling papers with embarrassment as the pundits distort the truth, mislead the public, and cater to the wealthy and the powerful.

We need to speak up. Say it. Cry out when the truth is distorted or misrepresented. Leave the room if the television personality has started to yell and name-call.

And even as we strive to use our words carefully, we need to just as carefully choose the rhetoric with which we fill our ears--not everyone understands exaggeration, swagger, irony, and hyperbole. And if you are one of the lucky ones who do, do tell the abusers of these linguistic forms nay by pointing out their misuse.

Or at least change the channel.

Roberta in Po-Town, Channel-hopping

10:02 pm est Comments

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Here you're suppose to learn about my personal life, my love of learning, the dog I don't have, my house that sits empty on a hill in Port Henry 'cause on the one hand I don't want to sell it, 'cause I love it too much, but on the other hand, I never seem to find the time to get there anymore but I haven't found a buyer. Of course I haven't been looking either. Too busy with Jolt. Also this site is still under construction so I probably won't get to selling it this month either. Well, that means, at least I can run up there over Labor Day and party with all my friends and neighbors there which is enough to make me want to hurry up and finish this so I can get ready to leave.

Here I am supposed to write more about myself and think about putting a picture of myself someplace below, except I put the picture in before I did anything else because I thought I was suppose to get rid of the butterfly but it didn't, which is probably just as well because I like the butterfly better. That's because it doesn't make me feel exposed like the black dress I'm wearing below does. The reason I chose that picture is because my sister C. thinks it's about the best picture of me I ever had taken. That's because I'm more mature now and most pictures look awful because they really look just like me. Of course C. thinks the one below does and all the other ones don't. Which a bit of a trip in itself. But what is there to say? And I'm glad she took it. R.