Month: May 2007

Heroes and Idols

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Laura and I were having a fascinating conversation with good friends which rolled around to the topic of teaching children about their future roles as adults. We got to talking about the types of role models that children have and the messages that they are being fed from our society about those adult roles. Out of that conversation came the following gem – speaking about a person being sensitive to the needs of those around them and responding to the needs of others rather than being focused on their own needs and their own image:

“That’s the difference between being a hero and being an idol.” Denise Black

The meaning being that an idol is someone who we might look up to who is more concerned with their image than their substance while a hero is more concerned with being worthy of emulation than they are with their level of popularity. In case anyone is wondering, there are those among the ranks of our social idols (musicians, athletes, actors) who qualify as heroes under this definition. The key is to help our children understand the difference between the idols and the real heroes.

Tags friends, insights, learning

General

Mike Jingozian

Although he is running for President, Mike Jingozian is more focused on the idea that we should remake our political machine. While the core values expressed have some merit, he fails to recognize that the vast majority of those who have the skills necessary to successfully operate our government are those who believe in, or more often have learned to work in conjunction with, our current political system. Calling exclusively for candidates outside that sphere will not result in better government, it will result in even more confusion and more room for exploitation by businesses and political professionals (like lobbyists and lawyers). It would be foolish to endorse this approach.

Tags national candidates, not endorsed

General life meta pictures technology

Where Do I Fit?

This morning I was thinking about my political orientation and wondering where I fit. I’m independent from a republican region. I am more and more in favor of a smaller federal government. I am convinced that we rely too much on the government, especially for things that the government is not well-suited to address. Libertarian ideals hold some appeal for me, except that I think there should be some measure of social norms that people should conform to – the chaos of anything being acceptable does not make an environment conducive to prosperity. This sounds republican so far, but I also believe that there are things that are more in line with the democrats or green party – such as the need to be responsible in our treatment of the earth and its resources – that tend to be ignored more in republican circles in favor of shortsighted business interests.

Conveniently, I ran into a pre-debate analysis of tonight’s republican presidential debate which offered some insights for me:

To what extent are the candidates going to be playing to a national audience rather than a California audience . . . There are issues that are important here — the environment and global warming, energy conservation, stem cell research — that are not as important in other states.

From the sound of it I have a lot in common with California Republicans – who’d have guessed.

Tags affiliation, thoughts

culture

Mob Intelligence

I love reading Terry Pratchett, for the humor, but I just discovered an extremely useful mathematical equation in Maskerade to calculate the intelligence of any mob.

“The IQ of a mob is the IQ of its most stupid member divided by the number of mobsters.”

Now if only we had an accurate definition of what a mob is – a definition that catches mobs even when they are not wielding clubs and other weapons.

Tags insights, quotes, Terry Pratchett