Letters to the Editor
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Kaliope:
Here are a few reliable sites for sorting out the New Age and related issues:
Mystic Bourgeoisie - A gonzo journalist gives us his book notes on the most thorough historical investigation yet into the Nazis, racists, and eugenicists, that brought us to this weird and terrible place:
http://mysticbourgeoisie.blogspot.com/
S.H.A.M. - Chapter One of the book S.H.A.M.: How The Self-Help And Actualization Movement Made America Helpless. Great reading and very informative - it all starts to become clear with this one:
http://www.randomhouse.com/crown/Sham/
The James Randi Educational Foundation - James Randi is Johnny Carson's friend, Penn & Teller's Hero, and the guy who busted the spoon bender, Uri Geller, and the evengelical faker, Peter Popoff. For about the last 15 years, Randi's offered a million dollars to anyone that can prove anything in the paranormal, New Age, etc. is real:
http://www.randi.org/
Penn & Teller's Bullshit! - The website for comedy duo's cable show, which blasts the hell out of a lot of sacred cows. I don't agree with everything they say but most of it is spot-on:
http://www.sho.com/site/ptbs/prevepisodes.do?episodeid=s1/eh
The Bad Homeopath - A medical student who's taking a "course" in homeopathic "medicine" and reporting his findings:
http://badhomeopath.com/
Skeptico - a blog from a guy that looks at a multitude of crazy stuff:
http://skeptico.blogs.com/
Quackwatch - Dr. Stephen Barrett's site that covers the medical scams involving Acupuncture, Chiropractic, Cancer, Autism, and a host of other fields:
http://www.quackwatch.org/
The Skeptics Society - The nicest guy debunking stuff, Michael Shermer's website for skeptics and scientific investigation:
http://www.skeptic.com/
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Self-actualization
Louis,
You said previously something to the effect of "i'm already the best me i will ever be." I don't know how old you are, but don't you think it's pretty arrogant to assume that you will not grow and change, that you will jsut stay statically the same guy for the rest of your life? What's the point of having travelling, like you say you do, of reading, of debating others, if not to learn more and to change? I'm pretty young, and i realize that i will grow and change, i hope this continues until i die. I don't think there's a point i will reach at some age at which i will stop changing. I don't want that to happen. If there were such a point, and you reach it, like you say you have, what do you do after? Where do you go from there? just continue floating on your plateau until you die?
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chivalry
"‘Men are rarely visible in the iconography of disaster. It is they who signify culture, and whose presence tends to locate a picture in its geographical context. They are most likely to be fully clothed or to be engaged in some task. As the strongest group they are least likely to conform to the expected image of the victim and the most likely to be involved in attempts at reconstruction or resistance, confusing the clarity of the story, complicating a reaction of pity alone. Thus the community to which the suffering child belongs is visually bypassed, and the extent to which it is caring for its own children is rarely explored.’ [emphasis mine]
I'm reaching here, but it seems to me, it is the role of women that runs through all of this."
I do believe you are reaching here. I believe our culture's fixation on female and child victims, as opposed to male victims, runs very deep. I think we can trace its roots back to the courtly love and chivalry of the Medieval period, a time when, as you know, women had virtually no power in society. Before that time, in Europe, a woman's life was considered less valuable than a man's. But when chivalry became fashionable, women (well, at least the "good" ones) were considered the embodiments of all that was innocent and pure and good. The Virgin Mary was promoted to near-deity status in the Catholic church. Reading Dante's description of his beloved Beatrice in "New Life" or "Divine Comedy" is quite jolting for modern readers. He seems to worship her. In the Arthurian romances, Lancelot goes to extraordinary lengths, even mutilates himself, to be with Guinevere. This doesn't mean that it was pleasant to be a woman back then (to be fair, it wasn't pleasant to be a man either). All it means is that women symbolized something for men at that time.
Even though the symbolization is a positive one, it is still dehumanizing. In the Victorian period, when chivalry made a huge comeback, it was used to keep women powerless. Many people believed that women were simply too innocent, too pure, to be allowed to participate in dirty things like politics, or voting. Participating in the big, cruel world outside their homes would hurt their delicate minds. The Victorians also loved to write poems about sick, dead or dying women and children. They weren't very intersted in male victims.
Men on the Titanic didn't give up their lifeboat seats to women because women had power over them. It was the men who had the power- they were bigger and stronger, and could probably overpower any woman they wanted in order to get a seat. The choice was theirs to make. But because they had been socialized with the concept of chivalry, sacrificing themselves seemed like the manly thing to do.
My point, after all of this, is that our society is in a phase of huge transition. We are still influenced by chivalry- this is why men sometimes give up their bus seats to women, hold doors for them, and buy them chocolates. I believe it is also why more attention is given to women who are victims of violence, war, etc. than men. It is also why, while young men were dying in the early days of the Iraq war, Jessica Lynch got the most attention in the media. But, the more real power that women gain in society, the more meaningless and useless the concept of chivalry becomes. We still cling to it because its roots run deep.
There are many different strains of feminism, and many pro-woman type things that get conflated with feminism. I assure you though, valuing women's lives at the expense men's has nothing to do with mainstream feminism.
I, a feminist, want to see more media coverage of male victims. Their suffering needs to be acknowledged, and their lives need to be given more importance. I also believe that if we valued men's lives more, we'd be much less willing to sacrifice them in war unless absolutely necessary (but that's a different debate for a different thread).
As far as the New Age movement goes, there's really nothing I can contribute to this discussion. I am from a conservative, deeply religious part of the U.S. where anything New Age is considered "the devil." All I can really say is, show me a New Age woman and I'll show you two or three evangelical Christian women who think New Age is bullshit.
Finally, I would like to personally thank you for your service in the Navy. Our wonderful country and the freedoms that we enjoy couldn't exist without brave individuals like you.