Cue Blondie

Santa Clause with headphones on his earsIn a recent post on another site, devoted to a US Supreme Court case on whether a nativity scene could be legally erected by a city using taxpayers’ money, I quoted the dissenting judge who argued against that the majority’s conclusion that such public displays did not contravene the First Amendment to the US Constitution; but it evacuated the religious display of its inherently religious meaning, he countered, to say (as they did) that it was just part of the city’s economic development plan. Continue reading “Cue Blondie”

In the New Old-Fashioned Way

Brenda LeeBeing Christmas day, it’s worth mulling over the artful way in which the arbitrary, changeable present and the authoritative past can be linked together to lend the appearance of continuity and necessity — the result being what we otherwise call tradition.

As if all history led to us, putting us in synch with the ages. Continue reading “In the New Old-Fashioned Way”

Blogger-Involved Commentary

The back of a police officerSeveral recent and prominent cases of shootings by law enforcement, each happening in different parts of the US, have made the use of deadly force by the police a national issue in a way that it hasn’t been before.

One of the things that I find interesting is the way the debate is framed, such as the very category used by media and government (but certainly not by the families and friends of the people who died…) to name these incidents: officially, they’re either called police-involved or officer-involved shootings. Continue reading “Blogger-Involved Commentary”

Only What’s on the Menu

A waitress taking customers ordersFor a long time my wife and I worked at different universities, in different U.S. states, and it required some long distance driving when we got together, which in turn required coffee. So I’d often stop into a McDonald’s while on the drive, pick up a cup and maybe some food, and then get right back on the interstate, to save time. Since I knew it was “to go,” I’d usually start off my order by saying, “Now, this is to go…,” but I always found that after I finished ordering — “Yes, of course: supersize that!” — they’d always ask,

“Is that for here or to go?”

It was as if they hadn’t even heard me answer that question right from the start. Continue reading “Only What’s on the Menu”

“I Am Neil deGrasse Tyson. Call Me That”

Neil deGrasse Tyson Howard UniversityWhen discussions of identification and labels note the complexity of labels and complicate the “strong cultural associations” that such labels often convey, I feel like cheering. So I was excited when my brother sent me a link to a nuanced NPR blogpost, “What if Atheists Were Defined by Their Actions?” by Tania Lombrozo. A professor of psychology, Lombrozo writes about Neil deGrasse Tyson’s rejection of the label atheist because he does not conform to the image and actions that people, including atheists and theists, associate with that label. Tyson discussed his views in an interview for the Rationally Speaking podcast. At 5:27, for example, Tyson succinctly highlights the problem of cultural associations, asserting, “Labels are intellectually lazy ways of presuming that you know more about someone that you have actually learned.” Continue reading ““I Am Neil deGrasse Tyson. Call Me That””