Campaign Commercials

Yesterday one of my friends sent me this video - a long-form campaign commercial for Rick Perry, the first I've seen in a campaign season that is already making me want to vote for Jimmy McMillan. (Not really - don't actually vote for him, please. It makes it harder for legitimate third party candidates to get taken seriously.)

There are a lot of things I could write about related to this, not the least of which being that it looks like a trailer to a Michael Bay movie (if I ever become a Hollywood director, I'd definitely hire whoever made this as my DP). What I want to talk about is a line at 0:58 in the video, a quote from Gov. Perry: "The United States of America really is the last great hope of mankind."

As a jaded voter, I'm largely unfazed by meaningless rhetoric like this. However, my first reaction was to suppose this statement will not play well with his base. One of the top 3 things I consistently heard from the "religious right" people I know personally during the 2008 campaign about Obama was a visceral negative reaction to his "Hope" campaign. "Christ is our hope!" they protested. (The other two things I heard were abortion and that he was The Antichrist, the latter from a depressing number of people.) If Obama's hope campaign was heretical, surely Perry's statement here is as well, even though both men are non-denominational Christians?

However, this doesn't seem to have been the case. A cursory search of the internet and a detailed read of an assault rifle owner's forum discussion thread about the video (doesn't get more right-wing than that, right?) showed nothing but support for the line, including from several people who use Bible verses in their online signatures.

Why is this? Is it that the perception was that Obama was claiming he personally was hope, while Perry is claiming hope on the part of the whole country? I suppose that's possible, though odd, since both men were focusing on what they would do in office rather than who they are. Is it just that Obama emphasized it more, so it was more out there for discussion (and you saw his face on posters that said "hope")? Again, possible, but many of the comments I read picked this line in particular out of that two-minute video, suggesting not just a neutral feeling but a positive resonance. Maybe it's just a poor sample size, and the people who were upset about Obama will also be upset at Perry over this. This seems more likely, though again, I heard the Obama complaint from a large majority of Christian Republicans I know, and I haven't come across one single negative reaction yet about Perry.

I want to think well of people, so I'm trying not to come to the conclusion that the answer is that the religious right contains many hypocrites who just used their faith to try and justify their political disagreement with Obama. If anyone has a more plausible explanation, I really would like to hear it.

Community

One of my hobbies is playing niche market board games, and I'm a semi-frequent contributor to the largest website serving the hobby. This particular site prides itself on being not just a database, but a community of users, and while I've certainly been flamed there before, the overall tone of posts is among the most civil and intellectual I've found on the Internet.

I read somewhere on the site that a fellow I "knew" peripherally had abruptly deleted his account and all of his posts, so I went to the thread in which that was being discussed to figure out what had happened. One of the posters wrote a few really interesting replies about how the term "Internet community" is a misnomer. (I think all of those make sense out of context, but I'd encourage you to at least read the first, if not all four.) To sum up, his argument was that community requires physical presence, and is concerned about the person as a human being. The Internet obviously precludes physical presence, and by its nature is primarily concerned about a person's contributions rather than their personality. Therefore, you can't have a real community on the Internet.

This really caused me to stop and think about the time I spend online. I've definitely resisted allowing time spent communicating via machines to replace time spent building more quality relationships. This is why I don't use Twitter, don't have a smart phone, quit Facebook for a time and even resisted text messaging before finally giving in. Still, earlier tonight I had a text message conversation with an old friend I haven't seen in a year or so, and she thought I was someone else until the last few messages. A depressing statement on our society, and one that left me asking myself: why didn't I just call her?

What's worse, though, is realizing that actual community is eroding even with personal (and in-person) relationships. We live in the suburbs, and while we talk with our neighbors somewhat regularly, I wouldn't say we know them well. They told us that some of the older residents of the neighborhood had told them the reason they moved to the suburbs originally was so that they wouldn't have to get to know their neighbors like people do in the city (though they've relented on that position a bit).

Worse than that is at church. I was talking about evangelizing with Liana recently, and about how most Christians' idea of that is to invite friends to church or a church function. Besides that I think it's sad that we can't live our lives in the world in a way that demonstrates Christ's love for us, I don't think the non-Christians are really gaining anything by sitting in the pews. Liana pointed out that the argument typically is to give them the chance to join the community. I replied that I was a Christian because I believe in Christ, and that if I was interested solely in community, there's absolutely no way I would continue going to church.

This is something I've thought for years, but I didn't realize how damning a comment on our churches that is until I said it out loud. The model of the early Church in Acts is one I've always found to be beautiful and one that we should strive to replicate, if not in letter, at least in spirit. What I've found is...well, not even close. I'm not claiming to be above the problem; I certainly don't have any close friends at the church we've now attended for 3 years. But it doesn't change that it's not really a community there (even though, ironically, we're in the process of merging with two other local churches, so we actually have "community" in our name at the moment). I think if we stopped going, some people would miss seeing our son, or my drumming, and I think the committees we sit on would miss our contributions. That's probably about it, and that sounds an awful lot like what would happen if we left a web site. I would be surprised if anyone tried to keep in touch with us - and, likewise, I can't think of anyone who I'd try to keep in touch with on a regular basis if they moved away.

So have we just lost the ability to form deep friendships as a society? Or was I just extraordinarily blessed when I was younger to have some people to connect deeply with, and I'm just expecting too much out of myself and others now?

Edit: And I just noticed the irony that I'm blogging about this.

Back to School

I started an undergrad college course this week. Those of you who have known me for a long time are surely snickering, if this is the first you've heard of it. Yes, I said never again when I graduated, but here I am.

It's Computer Science 101, which is essentially an intro to Java programming. Work is paying for it. The course has been all right so far, other than big hassles over the textbook (my second attempt at ordering online left Long Island at midnight last night; the first book I ordered was marked as shipped for a few days before they e-mailed me and said "oops, we actually meant out of stock") and the parking pass. It'll be nice to finally have a marketable skill when this is done. And I understand now why my friend Josh has the nickname "JOptionPain".

I've only been out of school for five years, but it's amazing how old I feel walking around campus, even in a night class at MCC where there are many non-traditional students. Not quite as weird as joining the church we're attending now and realizing that the college students put Liana and me in the same demographic as their parents even though we were only a few years older than they were, but odd nonetheless.

In a lot of ways, mid-twenties are a more awkward time socially than teenage years, though I at least feel less awkward now. Most of the time.

I Get Around

A few weeks ago, we sold one of our two cars in order to pay off the last of our student loans. This is the first time in my post-license life I've not had a car entirely to myself, and it's a very odd feeling. If I want to go somewhere and Liana needs the car, I either need to find a ride (and be at the mercy of the schedules of others) or get out Google maps and try to determine the most efficient way to get us both where we need to go.

This is nothing new for many of you, I'm sure. I remember years ago many of my friends got cars, then got jobs so they could afford to keep their cars, and consequently had little time to drive anywhere other than school or work. I never experienced that at the time, but I'm definitely there now - the classic "time and money are inversely proportional" situation. It's also given me a new respect for those who have never been able to afford a car at all, who are always reliant on rides, public transit or walking.

I'm sure I'll get used to it eventually, and having the extra several hundred dollars a month is worth it, but decade-old habits are hard to break.

Cultural Blackout

Liana and I decided that we want to introduce Peter to elements from many cultures as he grows up. Over the weekend, we were discussing how to celebrate African culture. We do have a CD of African music that Peter loves, but not much else.

I realized during this conversation that I know very little about historical African culture, even relative to what I know about Europe, Asia and the Americas. (A more accurate way to put that would be "any African culture", since I know there are significant differences in different areas, but I know little about any of them.) She asked me what people eat. My first thought was "not much, lately", and I'm still not sure, other than a vague idea that it's rice-based. She asked if there were any movies we could watch, and the best either of us could come up with was The Lion King. I could think of plenty more good and great films about the continent - Hotel Rwanda, Shake Hands With The Devil, The Constant Gardner, Lord of War, The Battle of Algiers, Blood Diamond - but none that I would consider a celebration of the culture (or appropriate for young children, for that matter).

Why is that? Certainly there are plenty of films that portray other cultures unfavorably, but there are also plenty that celebrate historical Europe, Asia and America. It seems that most of the stories about Africa are still focused on white people going in and destroying everything, rather than the positive things about the natives of the continent. Is it just that U.S. audiences don't want to be reminded of the cultural traits that have all but vanished due to European and American interference on the continent?

I do intend on reading more about Africa (and probably Oceana too, an area where it seems there's just not a lot either way in U.S. pop culture), but it still bothers me a little bit that there's not really an equivalent to, say, Braveheart or Dances With Wolves or Hero that doesn't feature lions as the main characters. I'm definitely open to suggestions; if I'm missing something, let me know!

The Story So Far...

Hello, Internet. This is my second attempt at a blog; the original one still exists here as of this writing and for the foreseeable future. This is going to be somewhat of a repost of my first entry there, just because I think first posts should give background on the author, but for the few of you who followed that other blog, I don't plan on reposting anything else. (And thanks for your support!)

My name is Jeremy. I'm from a suburb of Syracuse, NY called Chittenango, the birthplace of such notable folk as L. Frank Baum and Dave Mirra. I have a BA in Communication (journalism concentration), which was mostly a huge mistake. I currently live in a suburb of Rochester, NY with my wife and one year old son. If you want to know more about them, you should head here.

I'm the taller one.

I work for a small consulting firm as a technical writer, a profession I've often described as the Rodney Dangerfield of white-collar jobs. I aspire to be paid to write fiction full-time someday. This blog is mostly geared toward helping me achieve that goal by motivating me to write more.

Besides subjecting you periodically to my poems and short stories, this blog will mostly be non-fiction entries about my life - the usual bloggy stuff. My hobbies, interests and beliefs are disparate, so topics will vary a fair amount. I'm a practicing Christian, but fit few of the stereotypes associated with that in America (e.g., I voted for Kerry and Obama, and I think science is cool). I enjoy games; recently I've started playing video games more frequently again, and I also enjoy niche-market board games, and am working on designing a few of the latter at present. Politics interest me, and by "interest" I mostly mean "infuriate", but that's true of almost everyone I know who's paying attention. I'm an occasional songwriter and general music appreciator, and have mostly switched from playing guitar to drums due to some nerve issues in my wrists. I enjoy filmmaking both as an art form and as entertainment; I've had a short film receive positive marks after a film festival screening and I once hosted a consecutive screening of every Arnold Schwarzenegger movie.

One of my favorite parts of writing is coming up with titles for the pieces. One of my least favorite parts about having a general blog is coming up with a title for it. I was never really happy with my last title, and so I spent a lot of time thinking about what I was really doing here. I thought about mail, and how a blog is essentially a series of letters to everyone (or no one). So that's my title.

Thanks for stopping by. Hope to see you again soon.