Speak Up!

I may not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it! -Voltaire
(Okay maybe he didn't say that exactly but he did say somethin' sorta kinda like it- and I will defend to the death...)
Full disclosure time: Communication plays a big part in what I do. As a therapist, I help people find their own voices so they can say to others, to themselves, what they've always needed to say. As a pastor, I deal with the Word of God. And as a college professor, I teach young people how to communicate with the world around them. (As a actor manque I am learning how to interact with the words of the playwright and the actions of the others on stage.)
But sometimes we seem to be willing to let anyone say anything, and to take each just seriously as any other. I realize how hypocritical it seems for a blogger like me to look down upon others, and also to ignore the possibility that what is drivel to one person (me, for instance) might seem words of wisdom to someone else (uh, you, maybe?) (After all, somebody is watching Fox News.)
The issue, however, is that we seem willing to give airtime and attention to anyone saying whatever. That First Amendment aficionado in me would be willing to let anyone who wants to get up, as they do on Hyde Park Corner in London, and proclaim whatever they wish to whoever might listen (or no one, as the case sometimes is) But there is another part of me that rues the fact that we are confusing communication with vocalization.
Part of the problem lies, frankly, in the vast amount of mass media we have today. Tweets, blogs, Facebook, all are insatiable monsters calling for more and more input, however trivial or ephemeral. We do not censor ourselves; some things in our lives do not need to be shared with the universe, or, if at all, with only our closest and most trustworthy.
One of my favorite radio personalities, Colin McEnroe, recently had a show where he gave up the entire hour to a small group promoting a paranoid conspiracy theory about what really happened to the Twin Towers on 9/11. When I sent him an e-mail expressing my dismay that he had wasted airtime (and his own credibility) on such a topic, he responded very defensively and even became hostile toward me personally when I tried to suggest that he had fallen prey to the tabloidization of our society.
If someone chooses to proclaim gibberish, no matter how well-stated or glossily presented, they are not only welcome to do so, they are entitled to do so. But I not only have no need to listen, I also have to point out to others that what they are enrapt with is really well-stated and glossily presented nonsense.

Over the End of the World

It was a tough choice, but the topic was just sitting there, so...
First, let's check: is everybody here? Anyone taken up into the heavens this last Saturday?  No, this will not be another of those condescending, snarky comments about those poor deluded folk who blindly followed that radio evangelist off the edge of this ontological cliff, nor a defiant defense of the right to be wrong, even for the people that are wrong at the top of their lungs. Rather, let us discuss the increasing presence of those who propound the bizarre and the people who buy into it. This is not just about a misguided person who has his problems with math and the right dates. This is about people who believe some really weird stuff, people who are in a place where being factual and reasonable with them makes no difference. The president of the United States is a covert alien socialist terrorist. That sort of thing.
This used to be restricted to the supermarket tabloids, or to late-night talk shows, where intricate conspiracies were the dish of the day. Sure, there have always been paranoid fantasies that were pushed by people for their own reasons. (The moon landing didn't happen; it was staged...Flying Saucers have been captured and held in secret...The Twin Towers were deliberately destroyed on 9/11 by the American government...Kennedy was assassinated by government agents in conjunction with the Mafia.) But now the newsmedia seems to consider such as legitimate. Which raises what is really the question: are people really more gullible/accepting of anything/more paranoid or are the various media more desperate to fill space/just giving the public what they seem to want/trying to sell their own political point of view?
Of course, people have always shown a readiness to believe that can be either inspiring or frightening, depending on your point of view. Some superstitions are innocuous (don't get me started on the taboos of the theater!) Some border on the obsessive (what we believe gives way to what we are allowed to do or not do.) And some come from our human need to feel in control (ironically at the same time as we concede control to an arbitrary ritual.)
Let us stay on message: are people really more prone to accept even the most arcane with little or no question, or are we simply more aware of the cavorting minority that do? And who are we to make such distinctions? My deep and sincere faith might be unacceptable to someone else, just as their off-the-wall views would seem strange to me.
No answers here. But if you have any suggestions, I would be glad to consider how such a sensible person could come up with such ideas.

Who's Responsible?

We have become a society of victims. Powerless, unknowing, forever vulnerable victims,  never responsible for the awful things which happen around us and to us. The world around us becomes too complex, too abstruse, too difficult. Yet we are told (sometimes even by ourselves) that everything is our fault. So we go through life with this conflicted combination of guilt and martyrdom, resentful even of those who would help, as though the wagon train were to open fire on the cavalry riding to its rescue.
There are groups in our political landscape who seek to reinforce their version of this issue of responsibility for their particular political agenda, not out of concern for the various groups in question. At one and the same time, we are told that we should solve all problems merely by a healthy tug on our bootstraps yet put down if we try to show any initiative in the face of social restrictions. A woman is expected to overcome gender limits, a person of color the pigment of the skin, a low-income person the financial hurdles, this or that ethnic person the problems of learning a different language, a different cultural mindset, different food and clothing.
But this does not mean we should not assume our own sense of responsibility. I can remember a sign in the office of one of the agencies I have been affiliated with: "You may not realize that a lack of preparation on your part should not constitute a crisis on my part." The point here is knowing what we can do- and do it!

Risky Behavior

Just routine. The usual. Same old same old. The humdrum pattern of existence. Get up at the same time every day. Same breakfast. Take the same route to the same job. Deal with the same tasks with the same people. Leave work at the same time. Same dinner. Watch the same TV shows. Go to bed at the same hour. Maybe even have the same dreams every night!
Some people count on such regular patterns. Not that they are dull or uncreative people, unable to even peak over the rim of their rut; rather they find a kind of security in such routine. They may have grown up in just such a structured and predictable a world, neither being able to afford nor to risk a step off the beaten track. Or they came from a chaotic and scary family where everyone walked lightly out of dread of what might happen, neither able to speak openly nor able to act honestly for fear of the consequences.
Yes, there are those whose regular days are anything but regular. Not that they seek out the unstructured life, nor that they have such poor boundaries that they shift, weathervane-like, with every gust of anyone else's  tornado. Nor are we talking about those who only find a life worthwhile if it is lived on the edge. Rather, it is those who persist in wringing from life every bit possible.
Someone once wrote in an obituary: "He was born a man and died a grocer." There are many people who let the opportunities pass. "Risk" is not a word in their vocabulary; nor can they see the possibility of variation in their routine. Such openness need not be either reckless nor random. But too many people have confused familiarity with felicity, thinking fulfillment springs from nothing more than doing the same thing over and over and over.
If a person would change, and even knows what change to make, yet holds back not out of realistic consideration but out of anxiety for facing the unfamiliar, the moment might come when that train has left, that time has passed and the only thing left is regret. As the saying goes, there are many who end up living lives of quiet desperation. Too many climb to the top-most diving board, go out to the end of the board, gaze down...and then climb back down without jumping..

Minority Report

In Quaker proceedings, all decisions are done not by vote, but by "consensus."  That means that everyone agrees on the decision. There cannot be anyone who does not concur, or who has not participated in some way, shape, or form. Granted, there are flaws in such a way of functioning (the pressure just to go along with the crowd might be intense) but it has this: everyone is given equal standing and authority. Each person is expected to speak up, and each person listens to the rest.
We as a society might learn much from the Society of Friends (aside from their total commitment to peace.) Our American belief in acceptance of all peoples, including minorities, has been (as Shakespeare would have put it) honored primarily in the breech. Or rather, we have given certain minorities pride of place. We pay attention to those on the extremes of society, who ironically seem to want little to do with that society, rather than those seeking to make such a society better. (Fill in the political group of your choice here.)
Granted, those who deal with a world they cannot control by acting out in self-destructive ways need attention and care. (That's what I'm here for, ya know!) But we need not arrange our lives and the lives of others around the demands of those who do not always know just what it is they want. And it is especially tragic when the dysfunctional few, the minority, begin to set the agenda for everyone else.
Our challenge, then, is balancing the love and care necessary for the neediest with the lives of the rest of society. Some would resolve the issue by simply turning their backs on the neediest, not merely ignoring them but abusing them for being unable to single-handedly overcome prejudice and ignorance and social barriers. Others would become enablers of those who should be able to take care of themselves, those whose primary disability is a resistance to making hard choices.
Ultimately of course, we are each of us a minority. There is no one else in this world exactly like you. But we are not alone in this wide world. And only so far as we find common ground with others might we have a place to stand. That's something we all can agree upon.