Don't Tread On Me - America The Branded

Taken from The Daily Mail's website

I am on the District Line, traveling west, sitting across from a stocky young man who's just boarded at Whitechapel. This corn-fed meal with tanned skin, mirror sunglasses, loose fitting jeans and chunky sneakers wears a t-shirt with the words 'America, The Beautiful' in red, white, and blue on top of a vertical star spangled banner, behind which seems to float the diaphanous image of a woman's face that I can only assume is a feminine representation of 'America, The Beautiful.' I resist the urge to lean over to him and say, 'You know, people would have known without you announcing it on your t-shirt like that. And another thing: It's neither of the things you think it is - vaguely, subtly artistic or stylish.'

One is put in mind of the Irish poet Louis MacNiece: 'Why,/ Must a country, like a ship or a car, be always female,/ Mother or sweetheart?'

Why is it that as a nation we feel a desperate compulsion to label ourselves?

It's as though no one listened to Springsteen carefully enough to read irony into him.

Or as though we are still worried that someone might mistake us for being from somewhere else or belonging to some other cultural group.

No one will.

The minute we begin to speak, they know. Everybody knows. And it's no bad thing. What is a bad thing is trying desperately to label it and somehow make it chic or cool and pretend it's some artistic statement.

Here's what I like: on the same tube journey, an individual boards the train in jeans and plain, off-white t-shirt, sits down and starts tapping his feet to the rhythm of whatever tuneful track is playing away in on his MP3 player. It's then that I notice, his Converse Chuck Taylor All Stars, faded, worn, ragged, but clearly patterned with Old Glory, stripes on each side, stars down the tongue. A cheeky treading with the flag, not on it, naturally, not flashing, not waving, but toe-tapping with a wonderfully tacit acknowledgement of nationality as a simple, softly spoken part of who you are.

On the tube back, a heaving, humid, flesh-wall-cramped train car. A short stocky man of some sort of East Asian heritage squeezes on (melting pot significance, not passively racist. Swear). He is wearing red Bermuda shorts, a plain blue top, red, white and blue star-shaped sunglasses, a soft, fuzzy looking Uncle Sam style top hat and a red and white striped draw-string bag slung over both shoulders with a little American flag poking chirpily out the back. This too strikes me as utterly and completely appropriate. It's too loud to be obnoxious. This man is America personified, wearing the country, proclaiming the preamble like a big flamboyant flamingo shouting to all and sundry, 'I am the U. S. A!' without saying a word.

Taken from the Scavenge Costumes website

I'm not given to wearing my national colo(u)rs very often, the 4th of July being an exception some years, but I think what bothered me about the first man's shirt, aside from the inherent and age-old sexism and the mixture of telltale labels, was the pretension that there was some conscious art in declaring your national heritage, as opposed to treating it as some part of you that is as natural as your shoe size, as innate as a sexual orientation. We are Americans and intensely proud of who we are, but I'd rather we all avoid standing in odious uncritical hand-on-heart reverence to the flag, not in front of the foreigners, most of whom have a bit of a sense of humo(u)r about their homelands.

So, bundle of contradictions that I am, that's what I think we all need: more pride, less reverence. 

Violent Trauma, The Aurora Shootings and The Way of Lunacy

There are a number of ways to deal with the experience of violent trauma.There's therapy, which of course takes many forms: talking through the experience, associated memories, feelings and thoughts with a paid professional; art therapy, premised on giving vent and voice to your negative feelings and emotions through the creative impulse in a medium such as painting, sculpture or music; there's hypnotism, drawing the suppressed negativity to the surface whilst in a mesmerised state; there's repression, which we all do a bit of every day, i.e. we suppress the impulse to throttle our bosses because we submit to certain types of behaviour in order to live in civilized society; and we repress a certain amount of stress in order to function in every day life. Men are actively encouraged to repress their sentiments and affections for fear of appearing too soft, the long term effects of which are often cited as, among other things the reason why shaking baby syndrome occurs more often in boys and the reason Irish males between the ages of 18-25 account for one of the highest suicide rates in Europe.

And of course there's fantasy, not in itself a terrible or deleterious element of a constructive course of psychotherapy, but when prescribed by an amateur or a petition of social media users as a way of helping 58 shaken victims by confronting them with an image directly associated with the violent trauma they have experienced, as the above appeal that I came across posted on facebook three days after the shooting, started by Emily Sanchez, requests of Welsh-born star of The Dark Knight Rises Christian Bale, then it starts to sound a little bit less healthy and a bit more deranged.

The request tacitly acknowledges that the film will be indelibly associated with the horrifying experience inflicted on theatregoers by James Holmes. Else what would be the efficacy in having Bale dress up as Batman except as some kind of reparation of the image in the victims' minds for the upset that it may still be continuing to cause as a psychological symbol. But let's stop for a second. If you are dealing with the mental trauma associated with gunshot wounds or even being witness to an attack like this, in which your memory is clouded with smoke, gunfire, bodies falling, running all around and screams of terror and anguish and hovering above it all in your grey matter is the image of the DC Comics hero, larger than life looming towards you on a cinema screen, what is going go be the effect of seeing the actor himself, striding purposefully towards you in a hospital bed, wearing the exact same costume, replicating and amplifying the imaginational icon of fear for you? I can think of nothing more fear-inducing.

Thank goodness cooler heads prevailed and I do think it's good and noble of the actor to have gone to visit the victims of the shooting as himself, but isn't there a strong chance we'd be seeing a second set of headlines about further upset caused if this insane appeal had been acted on? The philosopher Slavoj Zizek, in an analysis of The Joker, Batman's nemesis and the character that James Holmes allegedly identified himself with before opening fire, says that the clown prince of crime is 'not a man without a mask, but, on the contrary, a man who is his mask -- there is nothing, no "ordinary guy" beneath it.' What kind of message are we sending if there is no ordinary guy beneath the mask of The Dark Knight, that there is no piecing together the brokenness of violence, no dissembling the experience of trauma?

Not only is this attempt to deal with the tragedy dangerous, but it is also insultingly trivialising for the victims. You would not see an appeal like this with any other situation in which a group from the public have been deliberately terrorised: not a Holocaust survivor, not a refugee from Iraq, not a family member who has lost a loved one in an IRA bombing. You may as well send Adam West, belly sagging over his utility belt, Robin at his side smashing fist against palm crying, 'Holy travesty Batman! We've just made light of an unspeakable horror!' And if that sounds flippant, it is only to illustrate the undeniable flippancy in Sanchez's probably well-intentioned and unfortunately popular effort.

The worst part about this campaign is that it seems to actively deny the real problem. It attempts to engage with nightmares through the use of escapism, instead of engaging with the issue in real, complicated terms. That poor, unfortunate community in Colorado, has sustained terrible loss and yet, as is the worrying trend in the wake of gun violence in America, firearm sales have spiked for fear that those pesky legislators in Washington DC may try through their dictatorial power of democratic process pass a law in some cockamamy attempt to protect the scaredy cat, commie citizens of this beloved nation. Fascists masquerading as elected representatives seem oblivious to the fact that we have to bear arms to protect ourselves from the fearsome colonial overlords trying any minute to quarter themselves in our homes. We must continue to perpetuate a perfectly healthy paranoia in the national psyche about ourselves and continue to desensitise our children to violence while guillotining any serious, difficult discussion about the real reasons individuals end up blurring the line between the value of human life and the enacting of a twisted psychological vision.

Until we, as a nation, recognise our collective culpability and initiate difficult national discourses about these issues, without leaders who only seem to grudgingly acknowledge days after the event that something must be done by the government of America to protect the citizens of America, I fear these unspeakable acts of violence will continue. Much will come out in the next few weeks about James Holmes and the unregenerable evil within his dark pit of a soul. It is almost certain that somewhere, he confused symbols of fantasy with his version of reality. Let us try to fight the good fight and refuse to give in to the same temptation. What do we become otherwise?

And I do know how it is. You see something in the sidebar or in front of you as you're scrolling down and it's a nanosecond of your time and an iota of effort to 'like' or 'share'. I've liked everything from Matt Smith to Debbie Harry and I'm pretty sure I've shared a map of Panem because I thought, 'Yeah, that makes sense with what the book says,' but there must be a line at which you stop and think about spreading an arguably callous, wrong-headed campaign. I also think that Facebook and other social media can be a force to effect great social change and information sharing, as jives with Tim Berners-Lee's great vision, but we also have to act conscientiously in what is by nature a superficial environment that often feels like it is all surface and no substance.

I have a feeling there are those who might think that I am spoiling a well-intentioned act, but there are many well-intentioned efforts that have ended in a jeremiad of despair, attempts to create a stronger German state for instance in 1938; more recently the attempt to prevent bloodshed through the location and elimination of weapons of mass destruction annihilating thousands of innocent Iraqis in the process; the effort to monitor the usage of libraries and the internet by free citizens in the name of preventing terrorist atrocities, swapping freedom for an anxious sense of security. We all mean well, but the extent to which we carry out our 'good intentions' can pave the way to a better world or a very bad place, as the adage goes.

I would end by saying that if I have caused offence, 'that you have but slumber'd here' but that would be to attempt an escape again, to elide the real and dark chapter in our nation's history that we must scrutinise unflinchingly if we are to avoid repeating it.

Do remember, I may disagree with you, but I'll do as Voltaire would have done to defend your right to say it.


This post was informed by the following article:

http://www.globalnews.ca/should+bale+visit+shooting+victims/6442684935/story.html

And Jason Farago speaks to our tendency as a nation to avoid complex national discussions in this article:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/jul/27/james-holmes-dehumanisation-causes-violence

This BBC Radio show features a fascinating discussion. Only about 28 minutes does someone finally call in and add a sensible voice to the discussion:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/p00vlk83/World_Have_Your_Say_WHYS_60Can_shootings_like_Aurora_be_prevented/

There Are Still Some Good Guys: Rosen Championing Reading For Meaning in the Great Phonics Debate

The piloting of the government's current obsession with phonics suggests some interesting, but deeply worrying results. 

 vs 

I grew up reading. My parents made sure to take me on regular trips to the local library during summer vacations when I was a child. My mother read to us every evening before bedtime. I was reading a mixture of Shakespeare and Stephen King (because I found a tattered old copy of Skeleton Crew in my older brother's closet, a hoarded away and hidden treasure to be devoured) for pleasure by the time I was coming to the end of elementary school and reading when I was younger seemed as natural to me as riding a bike. 

But I was lucky. 

I came to school with a certain cultural currency and my parents enabled me to learn that cultural currency with fluency and speed. Many that I teach and have taught over the last ten years or so are not nearly as lucky. Many do not understand how to read simple sentences out loud. Many have never been read to out loud. Many have never become familiar with the joy of fairy tales. Alarmingly, many are developing deep anxieties and even antipathies to reading for pleasure. 

I can think of no better way to expedite such a massive distaste for reading than the government's current efforts to stalwartly fly the flag for phonics, phonics and little else but phonics in reading education. All children in England from this year are required to take a 'Phonics Screening Check' test at the end of the academic year 1, (aged 6) in which they have to decode 30 real words and 10 fake words. The government is even offering an incentive of £3,000 which it claims 'will be hard to ignore for many cash-strapped schools' in order to promote the teaching of 'synthetic phonics'. 

The first examination took place in schools in June and the results were intriguing and unsettling. First of all, results were generally low, which the government may, no doubt say is down to teachers not having taught the 'synthetic phonics method' effectively. Could it be something deeper? Results also found that otherwise good readers had moved beyond just using phonics as a reading strategy, that they looked for meanings in the ten 'psuedo words', that their brains were making real words out of fake (eg storm out of 'strom') and some of the fake words were arduous to get one's mouth around, deterring children from pronouncing them as they were spelt. 

So, children score lower in the test for trying to make meaning out of what is unfamiliar to them. Trying to construct order out of the unknown, otherwise known as creativity and initiative, is marked down in this new compulsory test, whilst sticking to what you know and rejecting all familiarity will be marked higher. The government is, through mandatory testing and irresistible cash bonuses to schools, disincentivising initiative and independent thinking in young minds. 

One is put in mind of Gradgrind from Dickens' Hard Times: 'Now, what I want is, Facts. Teach these boys and girls nothing but Facts. Facts alone are wanted in life. Plant nothing else, and root out everything else. You can only form the minds of reasoning animals upon facts: nothing else will ever be of service to them.'

Say what you will about the American Education System.

Go ahead. Say what you will about it.

No, do. 

What worries me is that my son and many of his friends have already been raised up with a similar affinity for books and reading; what worries me is that when my son faces this test next year with his classmates, we will be sent a short letter home afterwards saying that he has scored low because he tried to make sense out of nonsense words, make meaning out of familiar looking verbal chaos. 

And what worries me greatly is that poorer schools in places like Hackney, where I live, will be unable to resist cash incentives for 'synthetic phonics' in the classroom. If the government wanted a docile, unquestioning mass of dunderheaded deltas and epsilons, unable to decipher complex treaties, pacts and agreements; antipathetic to compelling narratives anywhere except presented through moving images; unable to resist being oppressed through paternalistic power structures and figures; desiring nothing but bread, circuses and X Factor; and awed by the use of stutterings statistics and figures, a cynic might conlcude that there are fewer quicker routes that this one.

I owe most of the information in this post to Michael Rosen's intelligent and well-thought out recent blog posts and his continuing effort to fight the good fight. Please do read up on this crucial issue.

This post is also informed by the following articles:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2012/apr/08/teachers-union-criticises-phonics-tests

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/education/education-news/mps-goves-obsession-with-phonics-will-turn-children-off-reading-2308191.html

Not Your Typical Rainy Day Out in London Town: St. Paul's Cathedral

The wonderfully imposing structure of St. Paul's, standing since 1710 when it arose from Christopher Wren's imagination, still glowering austerely down over The City of London

After eight years of living in this ever impressive metropolis, I finally climbed up to the top of St. Paul's on Thursday. 

We arrived at the cathedral rather late and it's a bit of steep climb into your pocket just to afford admission at £15 a pop, which struck me as rather strange given that it's part of a Christian institution and given that there was such a public outcry when the Occupy Londonmovement 'prevented' worshipers and tourists from enjoying the grandeur of the great edifice. A cynical person might think the loudest outcriers were cityites attempting to rid themselves of any guilt pangs they felt about the act of trudging to and from the freemarketeering that brought one of the world's mightiest economies to its knees, endeavouring as it were, to sweep any reminders of unpleasant truths out of the bastion of beauty added to the world that sits amid the tax collectors. I digress. 

We arrived rather late and were debating about the worthiness of the price and the idea of walking across The Millennium Bridge to The Tate Modern when we decided, well how many St. Paul's Cathedrals are there in the world? As it happens, the price turned out to be worth it because here's your cheap living in London tip of the day: Gift Aid the money you pay for your ticket, and it turns into a reusable ticket for a year. Is there enough grandeur, enough humbling enormity in the heights of the dome, stunningly forward thinking imagination in the design and famous people buried in the crypt to make you want to go back for a second, third and fourth visit? Certainly, and I am glad I paid the price for it. 

But I am not great with heights. Fortunately, I decided to bite the bullet and not let my jittery sense of vertigo stop me form one of the most breathtaking sights in all of London. As with the CN tower in Toronto nine years ago, the nearest children to hand were braver than I was when we reached the top and there was a small glass in the floor from which you could see all the way down to the Cathedral floor. Of course, the nearest child this time around was my own, but at least I haven't passed this particular anxiety on to him. 

The vertigo-inducing view from the top.

And the view at the top was awe-inspiring. And humbling. Say what you like about old London town. There is a fierce and terrible beauty in those rows of slate grey emanating stories told and untold, generations upon generations of that wonderfully gruff mixture of peoples that make up this city. 

 I feel civically and globally obliged to mention that there was  protest the day we went. It was led by a group called Jews forJustice for Palestinians. I felt fully in support of the protest as they were protesting against an insidious Anglo-Danish company called G4S, a company that is contracted by the government to deport asylum seekers. 

The protest was also supported by The Boycott Israel network, about which I feel deeply ambivalent. I get the fact that the state of Israel has some deeply unsavoury policies, especially amongst hardcore Zionists, but I also know from having worked with Jews now for six years that, oddly, not all of them are Palestinian-hating hardcore Zionists and the Israelis who are most likely to be the exceptions, the liberals, the intellectuals, the open-minded Palestinian sympathizers are also the ones who are likely to be the actresses, actors, and academics who come over here to speaking engagements or to bring over productions of The Merchant of Venice in Hebrew and who are going to suffer because of boycotts. It just seems like a classic example of organisations making enemies out of exactly the kind of people to whom they should be reaching out.