*spoilers for more or less every single film mentioned in this article*

Last year, when Clint Eastwood showed up at the Republican national Convention and angrily debated America’s future with a chair, I don’t think I was alone in being horror-tained. The segment wouldn’t end, it made little conceptual sense (pretending your rhetorical opponent is there even though he’s not, without any other creative thought going into the bit), and weirdest of all, it wasn’t even accurate, as Invisible Chair Obama wasn’t arguing anything remotely close to what Visible Actual Obama has ever said. So most of America wrote the whole thing off as the rantings of a cranky old coot, an aging curmudgeon doing what aging curmudgeons do: bitching and moaning about the way America used to be and blaming minorities for the way things are.

Only this particular aging curmudgeon isn’t your grandpa. He’s Clint Eastwood. Clint Eastwood who, half a year prior, had been accused of starring in a pro-Obama superbowl ad: Chrysler’s “Halftime in America” spot, wherein Clint argued that America’s “second half was about to begin,” and that we shouldn’t give up just because we were down. Frankly, I found the accusations of the commercial being pro-Obama to be a little paranoid, but considering Clint’s politics (or what I’d thought to be his politics), I guess I could understand the resulting hysterics.

I assumed Clint’s politics to be fairly left-leaning, mainly because of his films. Well, that’s not true. I thought he was a lefty because of his film, Million Dollar Baby. To me it felt (feels) like the only Eastwood film with a strongly political message, i.e. the right to die movement, weighing in so heavily on the issue of euthanasia that it may as well have been a paean to it,  near-manipulative in how it paints who’s right and who’s wrong. Coming down on the side of euthanasia (and by pure coincidence, just before the Terry Schiavo incident), Baby seemed to brand Eastwood as a rare being—a liberal cowboy.

Except really Baby isn’t a leftist screed at all, and when you look again, at least at its political stripes, it comes off as just another crazy-grandpa diatribe from an old crank. Like the villain in Unforgiven (Gene Hackman’s Little Bill) who—horrors!—outlawed guns, or the little kids in Mystic River, who killed the girl because of those damned violent videowhatchamacallits the kids are always playing with, Baby is packed to the brim with cartoon characters who exist pretty much just to be cartoonish and to get some rantin’ and ravin’ off grandpa’s chest. Look at Maggie’s family, for instance, the repugnant clan who treat her like shit until she gets money, then try to get her to sign a will with her teeth—and who also, as the film gratuitously mentions, are on welfare (damn welfare families, stealin’ my checks!).

Or look at Morgan Freeman in his umpteenth role as a second-string Uncle Tom who stands politely on the sidelines and narrates the virtues of the really awesome white guy he’s friends with. Freeman once played Joe Clark in Lean On Me, a badass motherfucker of a high school principal who claimed, “I don’t gotta do nothing except stay black and die.” But then I guess Samuel L. Jackson started taking all those roles and Freeman happily stepped aside for white people to hang out center stage while he played sidekick and spent the film talking about their virtues: Driving Miss Daisy, Unforgiven, The Bucket List, Se7en—shit, even when he plays God in Bruce Almighty, he has to step aside and make a white dude the center of the universe. It’s unsurprising, then, that Freeman and Eastwood are frequent collaborators. I don’t know which one of them built the mold and which one of them fit it, but I do know that once I realized what a Trojan Horse for conservative ideals Million Dollar Baby was, I started thinking of yet another Freeman film.

The Shawshank Redemption is beloved—and rightly so. I don’t want to step on any toes here (the film has been rated #1 at imdb pretty much since that website’s inception, and there’s a reason it plays twenty-six times a day on TNT). I love it to death and can quote it backwards and forwards—impressive for a three-hour film. But what’s always confused me about it is that it is, indeed, universally embraced, even—especially—by my rather conservative friends and students. This is confusing because it a) takes place in the left-leaning Northeast and purports to espouse those values, b) was written by the notoriously liberal writer Stephen King, c) is staunchly anti-death penalty and pro-reform, and d) stars the notoriously liberal activist Tim Robbins (who followed the film up with Dead Man Walking, another anti-DP film). My conservative friends (and conservatives in general) believe firmly that prisoners aren’t very valuable human beings; they’re against prisoners having voting rights; they’re in favor of capital punishment; they believe we should spend as little as possible on food and amenities for prisoners; they don’t even question the length of prison sentences, the horrible conditions, or whether the punishment fits any one prisoner’s alleged crime. And yet these same friends of mine have screennames like Andy37927, and send me youtube videos paying homage to specific shots and scenes. Hmm.

Well first, let’s just dispel the obvious counter-argument that I’m sure you or they or anyone reading this will make, which is that Shawshank is just a film, and that just because I have trouble separating my entertainment and my politics, it doesn’t mean everyone else does. Well, okay, except lovers of Shawshank don’t look at this thing like it’s just a movie. I’ve had at least twenty students write about the film’s values and sensibility and teaching methods for my class. There are message boards and forums all over the internet whereupon people argue about it. My aforementioned conservative friends point to it, like a racist person showing pictures of his one black friend, in defense whenever I tell them they’re single-minded in their worldview, as if to say that by being a fan of the film, you’re embracing liberal values themselves.

Except that, like Million Dollar Baby, it’s actually shockingly conservative, when you think about it. For one thing, while it does expose the prison system as corrupt, that system works—Red is indeed reformed by the end, as demonstrated by his final speech to the parole office (“I want to see my younger self and shake some sense into him. There isn’t a day I don’t regret what I did”), so you have to rethink all the violence the guards did to the prisoners in the preceding two-and-a-half hours and realize that maybe it was for the best. And sure, Brooks get institutionalized, but Brooks is about three-hundred years old, and while he does hang himself, I’m pret-ty sure he was gonna die soon anyway (sorry). And on the subject of reform and police brutality, what’s with the Sisters? Why is it that Bogs gets paralyzed as a result of beating Andy, and it’s staged so that we’re supposed to cheer at this? Can Bogs not be redeemed or reformed? Is he really “not human” as one character states? Is redemption only reserved for our central characters?

And Andy himself presents problems, too, once you start thinking into the film this way. While certainly an interesting character, he’s also innocent (unlike, for instance, Sean Penn’s character in Robbins’ own Dead Man Walking), which makes it much, much easier for us to “like” the prisoners and see Norton the Warden as a villain, picking on a guy who didn’t do anything. Likewise, we never even see Red’s crime (we do in the book, btw, which is politically much more sound although artistically far less enjoyable or rich), which makes it extremely easy to side with him, and to get on board with Freeman’s—wait for it—narration of the virtues of the white guy who’s center stage (boo ya—you didn’t think I was gonna connect all this, did you?).

“You’re thick as thieves, you are,” says Norton the Warden to Red when he finds out Andy’s escaped. And I can’t help but think the same thing about people like Eastwood and Freeman (and plenty of others, including TV creators as well) when I recognize that some pretty ugly sentiments are being snuck under the door, wrapped up in some pretty nice packages—really nice. Because I love Shawashank, I swear.

The post Thick as Thieves appeared first on Rookerville.

Let’s imagine a hypothetical situation for a moment. Let’s say you have a job that allows you to work from home from time to time, and on this particular day, you’re trying to meet a deadline on some sort of project. Now let’s say you were on the phone with your hypothetical sister the day before and agreed to let her drop off your two hypothetical nephews at your home today for a couple of hours so she could take care of a few important errands. They’ll already have had lunch, and they’ll practically entertain themselves, she said. Sounds fair enough, right? Let’s say the kids are school-aged, around first and third grade; old enough to understand good and bad behavior and the consequences that accompany both choices. When they show up at your place, they both have backpacks full of Legos. More Legos than they could possibly need in the two hours they’ll be there. You make sure they’re comfortable, and then go back to your project. Let me know if you need anything, you say. For a while, there aren’t any issues. Everyone is happy. But after the initial honeymoon period, they start fighting over the Legos. Fighting so much that you have to get up and mediate. There are so many Legos to play with, you say. Just share with one another. They agree, and you go back to work. Minutes later, they’re at it again. More tantrums. You break it up again. This cycle continues for the duration of their time with you. It is very difficult, if not impossible, to get to work. Finally, your sister returns, sees what’s been going on, takes the Legos away, and puts the kids in opposite corners of your home. She’s disappointed in your lack of childcare abilities, and your clients are disappointed that you didn’t meet their expected deadline. You weep softly.

Sound frustrating?

Welcome to the 2013 BART strike.

Sunday night, Governor Jerry Brown (your sister) stepped in (took away the Legos) and instituted a seven-day hold (sent them to time out) on another imminent BART (nephew) strike (tantrum), temporarily saving commuters (your clients) from a repeat of the five-day strike (first tantrum) which had impacted them (prevented you from getting to work) only a month ago.

Woof.

Negotiations have been going on for quite some time, with both sides rarely giving any ground and seemingly at a standstill for the last several weeks. The week leading up to the 4th of July featured crippling traffic, hours-long lines at ferries, and an entire city that lost any sympathy for either side of the debate amongst transit workers. The two sides allegedly met for TWENTY-NINE hours this past weekend without successfully reaching an agreement, which leads me to believe that the negotiations must go something like this:

Mediator: Okay everyone, we’ll be commencing today’s negotiations in attempts to bring resolution to the issues we’ve been discussing these past weeks.
Union: We want more money.
BART: LOLZ.
Union: But…more money?
BART: Nerp.
Union: Derp?
BART: Nerp.
Mediator: Okay well it seems like tensions are running a bit high right now; why don’t we break early for lunch? Napa’s not too far away – Domaine Carneros, anyone? Maybe meet again in 5-6 hours? What’s that? We told the interns they’d get a full day of pay? Okay, just keep the clock running. No one will know the difference.

It’s understandable that these types of negotiations will get both activists and defenders of heads of businesses alike a bit riled up. Unions versus corporations? This ideological battle has been going on for ages. But unlike the DC nurses strike (which was about patient care but actually about money) or the Chicago teachers strike (which was about evaluation criteria and classroom composition but actually about money) or the NFL players strike (which was about player safety but actually about money), the BART strike is only about money. In kind of a dick move, the management team made a point of highlighting the workers’ salaries and compensations to the press, but seriously – 90K a year on average, not having to contribute to their own pensions, a low, flat rate for healthcare regardless of dependents, cost-of-living raises AND regular bonuses…what the hell?! These are the most well-compensated transit workers in the country, and somehow neither side can get it together. THERE ARE A TON OF LEGOS, KIDS. Also, if you’re thinking to yourself that you don’t really hear about this stuff happening in other transit systems across the country, it’s because in many of them, strikes are ILLEGAL.

The fact that Governor Brown has had to intervene and create an investigatory panel is perhaps the most frustrating part of it all. Two groups of working adults and mediators – whose only job is to, you know, mediate – were so ineffective at reaching a compromise that the government had to step in to fix things. I repeat: the government, who at this time is mostly known for not being able to get things done, had to help someone else get things done without further harming the public. This isn’t the NFL referee strike, where consumers dealt with a minor inconvenience and drop in the quality of a product. This is as if the referees left, had no replacements in the interim, and also took away all the footballs. I think I can speak for a substantial portion of the public by saying that I really have no care whatsoever as to who comes out ahead in these negotiations. The people who suffer the consequences of inaction have no say in the debate. Their day-to-day schedules and ability to make a living are at the whims of people they will never meet. They won’t see fare reductions or an increase in service at the end of this. They just want to get where they’re going in a reasonable manner, for the transit infrastructure of a major metropolitan area to operate as it was designed.

Please, children. Place nice.

The post Children, Place Nice appeared first on Rookerville.

There are two distinct phases of my life that I believe have shaped my world view entirely. The first was my final two years of high school, where instead of doing classic teenager things like smoking blunts behind the cafeteria or trying desperately to get laid, I was heavily involved with my church, leading retreats, organizing youth group meetings, and serving as an altar boy right as the priest sexual abuse scandal was coming to light (to answer your question, no). The second phase began immediately after the first, as I decided on Ithaca, NY as the location for my undergraduate education, a place sometimes referred to as “the most liberal city in America” and also once dubbed “The City of Evil” by an unabashedly conservative group called Behind Liberal Lines. These atmospheres may seem in direct contradiction to one another – and they were – but these six consecutive formative years had the effect of balancing out my attitudes towards religion and politics, as well as dropping me comfortably in the center of the everlasting struggle between traditions and contemporary realities. I’m a socially liberal Catholic. It works.

To be honest, I think this – voting on behalf of the poor and disenfranchised, supporting legislation for equal rights – is probably more in line with what Jesus was getting at a couple of millennia ago, a sentiment I’ve been happy to see being echoed on more than one occasion this week by Reza Aslan in his increased exposure since his Fox News “interview” (see Ted McLoof’s piece for more insight on that debacle). A little less Bible-thumping and dogma, a little more, you know, being good to one another. The Golden Rule and all. And that is why I found it, frankly, wonderful to hear Pope Francis’s response to a reporter’s question regarding gay clergymen.

“If someone is gay and he searches for the Lord and has good will, who am I to judge?”

Let me be very clear – this is not a resolution of intolerance by any means, nor a surefire end to the perplexing closed-mindedness of much of the religious right. But at the same time, it is impossible to overstate the significance of the Pope, the man charged with being the voice of God on Earth for 1.2 billion people worldwide, public and definitively declaring an acceptance for both gay members and leaders within the church. Saying he has no business judging the sexual orientation of people of faith is a remarkable divergence in philosophy from an institution (the Vatican) that tends to be a tad bit judge-y. Could this be the beginnings of a sea change? Or just a blip on the radar? I really have no idea. But it is something. When we form our opinions on certain groups based on the comments of a few prominent figures within that group, it’s easy to fall into generalizations as a means of categorizing the institution as a whole. That being said, I do believe that there are far more Catholics on the progressive side of the coin than society realizes, and while they are still likely in the minority, the recent comments of the Pope can only serve as a breath of fresh air and an affirmation on their behalf. I can remember my dad – who, as I’ve touched on briefly before, is great at doling out important life lessons to his children and then forgetting they happened – coming home from Mass after a particularly anti-homosexual homily and remarking, “I’m pretty sure Jesus didn’t say ‘Love everyone, except for gay people’.” The point being there are many people out there like this, not to mention a completely different contingent – those who will do pretty much anything their priest tells them to – on whom the Pope’s words could have a very positive impact in terms of perception of equality.

It’s currently unclear if this comment will truly contain any weight or have any lasting effect on the attitudes on inclusiveness of the Roman Catholic Church. Perhaps we need the coming weeks or months or even years to see it truly flesh out. But every Pope has his legacy. In my lifetime, John Paul II was focused on empowering and involving the youth. Benedict XVI had an affinity for dogma and red leather shoes. Francis became the first Pope from the Americas, adopted the name of a saint who championed the poor and the environment, and now seems adamant to clean up the widespread corruption that plagues the Vatican. Will he also be remembered for being the most forward-thinking contemporary Pope, one who led the church and its followers into a progressive new era? For now, at least there’s hope.

It’s not a fix, but it’s a step in the right direction.

The post A Step in the Right Direction appeared first on Rookerville.

“Ma’am, you may not have heard of me,” Reza Aslan told Fox News reporter Lauren Green on the internet show Spirited Debate, “but I’m actually a fairly prominent Muslim thinker in the United States.” Well, that’s an understatement. Aslan is not only a “fairly prominent” Muslim thinker but arguably the most widely- and well-respected religious scholar we have. Thinker being the operative word, because Aslan is neither a pundit nor an activist (at least not for any cause more narrow than peace and understanding). He belongs to a subset of public voices once revered but now sorely needed in this country: Experts. We lost something as a nation when anti-intellectualism became not just okay but championed, when the notion that I-know-as-much-as-the-next-guy became a standard. Thinkers like Aslan are marginalized in favor of subjective, inflammatory peddlers of talking points, because the latter get better ratings.

I’ll mention briefly my earliest encounter with Aslan’s work in order to highlight my point about how not just stupid but disrespectful Lauren Green was. As a sophomore in college, I was curious to learn about world religions, and had even briefly considered converting to one. Since I felt I knew a fair amount about the Western religions, and since I’d already studied Hinduism and Buddhism at various points before then, I was interested to learn about Islam. I was embarrassed that I knew so little about one of the most populated religions on earth. I went to Barnes & Noble’s “Religion” section and found Aslan’s No god but God: the Origins, Evolution, and Future of Islam, which was brand new at the time. The preface drew me in immediately, an anecdote wherein Aslan ran into Christian missionaries on a train through Morocco. He had (has) a gift for narrative and an ability to break down very complex arguments into the kind of clean, direct prose that even an amateur like me could understand. Yes—if anyone could indoctrinate me, it would be this guy, and I wanted to be indoctrinated. But what actually ended up disappointing me was that the book is exactly what the title suggested: not Islamic conversion propaganda but very literally a historical text about the religion.

Disappointed as I was, it’s of course exactly because of Aslan’s intellectual curiosity, rather than some sort of underhanded religious agenda, that’s won him a solid academic reputation which extends far outside of the world of academia. He’s often called in to write guest columns in the Times, the Daily Beast, Slate, et al, and is happy to appear in promotion of his books (but not, please note, as a fill-in panelist or talking head) on shows like Nightline and Real Time with Bill Maher.

He was on Maher last week, in fact, promoting his new book Zealot: the Life and Times of Jesus of Nazareth. It’s always interesting to see Maher and Aslan spar. Maher pretty famously hates religion, and loves nothing more than to put the entire enterprise of religion down at any opportunity. (Maher is also, deny it if he likes, staunchly Islamophobic, frequently painting Islam as a “more hateful” religion than any of the others. Normally he gets away with that kind of dismissive bullshit, but once, when Aslan was a guest and Maher said, “Not all fundamentalists are the same. Don’t give me that. Their [middle eastern] fanatics suicide bomb people, ours don’t do that,” Aslan responded, “Well, Bill, our fanatics live in suburban middle class American neighborhoods, theirs live on piles of rubble where their houses used to be, so there is a bit of a cultural divide there.”). This time, Maher, in conversation with Rev. Jim Wallis, claimed that the Bible was tainted “like a turd in a pool” by nonsensical rules, like killing your neighbor if he works on a Sunday. Wallis suggested that many critics of the Bible haven’t read the whole thing, to which Maher replied, “I have, actually, I took a whole course on it” (which, when sitting at a table with Wallis and Aslan, six theological degrees between them, must have made Maher feel at least a little stupid for saying. I mean, I took a course in Chaucer as an undergrad; I’m not exactly fluent in middle-English). Aslan patiently replied, “There’s nothing easier than scouring the scripture for little bits of savagery, and then talking about how ridiculous it is. But even the most literalist literalist is not a literalist—the reason the Bible is such an important book and has endured over so many years is because it can be whatever you want it to be.”

All of this is to say that Reza Aslan is a cool, even-handed individual who has no ulterior interest in religion besides discussing it in a scholarly way. Lauren Green, however, opened up her interview with, “You’re a Muslim, so why would you want to write a book on the founder of Christianity?” Aslan, understandably, looked taken aback and replied, “Well…to be clear, I’m a religious scholar with four degrees, one of which is in the New Testament, and fluency in Biblical Greek, who has been studying the origins of Christianity for two decades who also just happens to be a Muslim. I’m not just some Muslim writing about Jesus, I’m an expert with a PhD in religions.” Green pressed on, however, reading off of her notecards, which obviously had zero questions about the book itself and only about the author’s personal religion. Hoping to put that to bed, Aslan pointed out that his book isn’t even about Christianity or even Jesus in any kind of religious context but rather a historical document of Jesus the man, whose death (Aslan’s words) “resulted in the greatest religion the world has ever known.” I don’t know how Green could have expected him to be any more respectful than that, but she still pressed on, analogizing Muslims and Christians to Democrats and Republicans, respectively, stating that this is like a Democrat writing a book about Reagan (I don’t usually watch Fox News—I always assumed people’s jokes about them thinking of Reagan as the second coming were hyperbolic, I never knew this is the kind of shit they actually say). Aslan, exasperated, said, “Well, no, it’s like a Democrat with four degrees in the subject of Reagan writing a book about Reagan.” Asked why some scholars disagree with Aslan’s findings in the book, he had to explain that, well, that’s what scholarship is—people coming to diverse conclusions based on historical texts. Finally, in easily the most ridiculous moment, Green pontificated on the fact that Aslan has never publicly stated he was a Muslim, which resulted in his retort that begins this article.

Without getting into the subject of Islamophobia, let me just say that…actually, never mind. Let’s get into it. First of all, Green is of course wrong in her Democrat v Republican analogy (in her defense, she was quoting someone else) because actually Islam and Christianity are not by any means in opposition to each other. Apart from the way that any given religion is in a “competition” for people to become members (and any given religion by definition considers their own beliefs “right”, hence all others “wrong”), there is nothing at all in either the Bible nor the Koran that suggests some sort of diametrically opposed belief system singular to these two religions, so obviously (I can’t believe I even have to point this out) a member of one doesn’t mean an enemy of the other. Secondly, there’s nothing in the Koran to suggest that Islam is an evil or hateful religion (n.b. the parenthetical above regarding right/wrong),  which is why people like Maher and Green have to resort simply to characterizing Islamic people as behaving maliciously. As a result of this, you often hear the argument that it’s totally sensible to be suspicious of Islamists (or even simply middle-eastern people, regardless of religion), since the majority of terrorist bombers have been Muslim. This is not only totally racist but an established, well-known logical fallacy called the “fallacy of the undistributed middle”, in which we make a conclusion about the whole based on an unrepresentative few (for other examples of small-minded people trying to win arguments this way, see arguments against: single mothers and black people).

Anyway. Joke’s on Lauren Green, Spirited Debate, Fox News, and whoever it was who wrote those cue cards for her, I guess, because far from the desired of effect of making Islamists look like zealous heathens who want nothing more than to bring fire and rage to the American people, Aslan, as always, conducted himself with dignity, and made me remember why I’d considered converting in the first place.

Full interview here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YY92TV4_Wc0

The post To Be Clear: In Praise of Reza Aslan appeared first on Rookerville.

This trial has received national attention because it involves two very sensitive, social issues in the United States: race and guns. On February 26, 2012, there was a confrontation between Trayvon Martin and George Zimmerman which ended with Zimmerman shooting and killing Martin. The incident occurred in Sanford, Florida at a gated community. Martin was a 17 year old African American male. He and his father were visiting his father’s fiancée who lived in the community. Martin went to a 7/11 to get an AriZona Iced Tea and a bag of Skittles. When he was returning home, he was talking to a female friend on his cell phone and noted that an individual was following him. The person following Martin was Zimmerman, who was part of the neighborhood watch of that community. The community had endured a number of break-ins and a shooting in the year leading up to the incident. As such, Zimmerman had suspicions about a stranger in a hoodie walking around the neighborhood and called the police. As Martin was afraid of being followed, he ran and Zimmerman followed. The dispatcher advised Zimmerman not to follow and to meet with an officer. However, Zimmerman got out of his car. A confrontation between the two individuals ensued and those details are the only facts we know to be 100% true. Zimmerman claimed self defense. He noted that Martin punched him and was slamming his head against cement. As he feared for his life, he had no choice but to shoot Martin.

When I first heard about this story, I was outraged as I could not understand why there was no trial when an unarmed teenager was shot and killed. Moreover, he was followed by an individual with a gun. While I agree with the presumption of innocence until proven guilty, I believed that it needed to go through the judicial process so we justice can be served no matter what the outcome may be. Eventually, public outcry put attention on that matter and we had a trial.

The Verdict

I waited all of Saturday to see the results of the verdict. I was not present at the confrontation between Zimmerman and Martin so I do not know what happened and cannot conclude whether Zimmerman is truly innocent or whether he committed a crime. No judicial system is perfect. As such, our system is set up to assume someone is innocent until proven guilty. As such, it is the burden of the state to prove Zimmerman guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. Our society believes it is better to allow a guilty person to be free than an innocent person to be imprisoned. While it obviously does not always function that way, our system is setup the best it can to weight the percentages in that manner. I completely agree with this philosophy. Consequently, Defense Attorney Mark O’Mara was absolutely correct in his closing argument when he plead with the jury to “”Do not give anybody the benefit of any doubt except George Zimmerman” As such, I was ready to accept whatever verdict the jury reached as I respect our judicial system and the rule of law.

Based on the evidence that was presented, I definitely do not think Zimmerman was guilty of second degree murder beyond a reasonable doubt. That charge requires the defendant to have a depraved mind with no regard for human life. As he called the police before the incident, I definitely do not believe he had any intention to kill Martin before their confrontation began. Moreover, the prosecutors did not do a good enough job on proving a depraved mind beyond a reasonable doubt. However, I would say the prosecutors had a tough case to build. There were no witnesses at the scene. There were residents of the communities that heard screams but no one appeared at the scene until after the shooting. As such, there were only two people that know for sure what occurred on that night and one of them is deceased. There was only one point the prosecution could have made to disprove self defense. Zimmerman had his gun concealed near his back. If he was pinned as he stated, it is a legitimate question to ask how he was able to draw the gun. Was it already drawn already? Did Martin reach for it and start pulling it out? We have no way of knowing for sure and did not come closer to knowing the truth after the trial. Regardless, the burden of proof is on the prosecution and it was not able to meet that burden.

In terms of manslaughter, it is less of a burden: “the killing of a human being by the act, procurement, or culpable negligence of another, without lawful justification”. The facts are that Martin was killed and Zimmerman killed him. As such, the only question is whether he had lawful justification, which is self defense. Based on Zimmerman’s account, it is good case of self defense. One can question whether Zimmerman should have left his car. However, one cannot assume that there was no situation that developed where Zimmerman needed to defend himself. As such, there are too many assumptions one would have to make to conclude that Zimmerman did not act in self defense without a reasonable doubt. While Zimmerman made some politically incorrect statements about Martin to the dispatcher, it does not have any bearing on whether Martin was the aggressor or severely assaulted Zimmerman. As there was no convincing evidence otherwise, I would have came to the same conclusion the jury did in acquitting Zimmerman.

Trayvon Martin’s parents may eventually file a civil suit against Zimmerman. In that case, the burden of proof would be significantly less and assumptions can be made against the defendant that is not permissible in a criminal case. Moreover, he may testify and defend himself against accusations since he will no longer have the fear of jail time because of double jeopardy. If a civil case occurs, we may get more information on what actually occurred that night.

My Response

As I stated above, I agree with the verdict based on the Florida law. However, I am also not convinced beyond a reasonable doubt that Zimmerman acted in self defense. I cannot prove he is innocent but I can definitely not prove he is guilty. As such, I just do not know without more information. Nevertheless, I believe in how our system is setup and accept that Zimmerman is an innocent man. I would also plea that we should all believe in the rule of law and accept that Zimmerman is an innocent man unless proven otherwise. We should not be rioting nor should we try to be vigilantes. To be realistic, not everyone will feel the same way and someone may try to take the law into his own hands. I believe Zimmerman should be able to live in peace and no longer be vilified unless there are facts or subsequent admission from Zimmerman that prove otherwise. Unfortunately, he has a lot of reason to fear for his safety for the rest of his life because of his notoriety after this trial.

However, I do think that Zimmerman had poor judgment. First, he incorrectly profiled a teenager as a criminal. It was not a racial profile but he was definitely making a criminal profile. Moreover, I believe he acted as a vigilante by following and pursuing Martin and based on the dialogue Zimmerman had with the dispatcher. He called the police and should have allowed them to handle it. He should not have pursued and should not have left his vehicle. While what he did may not be illegal, he does have some culpability in initiating the confrontation regardless of what occurred afterwards. We do not know the details from Martin’s side as he is deceased. Martin knew someone was following him. While Zimmerman may have reasons to be suspicious of strange individuals because of the history of crimes in his neighborhood, Martin would have a reason to be concerned about his safety when someone is following him for the exact same reason. There may have been reasons Martin feared for his safety in his confrontation with Zimmerman and needed to defend himself. To be fair, we also know Martin profiled Zimmerman. Regardless, I think Zimmerman made some poor decisions that put him in a situation where he needed to defend himself. On the other hand, Martin could have fled home and called the police. Both individuals were put in a situation they should not have been in and it is a situation that was avoidable.

In the end, it is a tragedy for all parties. Martin lost his life when he was unarmed and just trying to get iced tea and skittles. On the other hand, Zimmerman was on the neighborhood watch and just wanted to protect his neighborhood. He was also frustrated with the crimes committed against his neighborhood. He had good intentions but it ended with a terrible result. His life will never be the same as he needs to live with the fear of retribution from misguided individuals and the guilt of killing a human being, who he now knows was just a teenager and not trying to commit a crime.

Social Issues and Future

First, we should not hold George Zimmerman responsible for our social problems. Nevertheless, the trial did bring up a lot of issues we need to discuss as a society. In simple terms, we need to do better. A child should be able to go to a store and return home without being profiled and stopped without a legitimate reason. Our law assumes innocence before being proven guilty and gives our citizens that benefit of the doubt. As individuals, we need to apply the same principles. We cannot be acting as vigilantes, profiling individuals, and concluding on whether someone is guilty. While I am not suggesting Zimmerman acted as jury, judge, and executioner, it is a scary thought that someone can potentially bring a gun, initiate a fight, and kill the other person in the name of self defense if there are no witnesses. For the African American community, I do not blame them for being very concerned about the potential precedent. In New York, the laws would not have permitted bringing a gun to a fist fight. Nevertheless, each state needs to have its own discussion on what changes, if deemed necessary, need to be made to laws and what changes we need to make as society to move forward on the race and profiling issues.

On the other hand, Martin also profiled Zimmerman as he noted he was a “Creepy Cracker”. As such, we need to look at the problem at both ends. Racism goes both ways. We have made significant progress as a society but we are naïve if we believe that racism no longer exists. However, I believe racism has become subconscious rather than conscious. As racism has become unacceptable in our culture, most people do not purposely discriminate against other people. However, we still have our individual biases and perceptions of other groups. As it is more convenient to extrapolate our assumptions of a group to every individual within that group, it is difficult for us to fight to those natural assumptions. After the trial, I concluded that Zimmerman probably did not profile Martin because he was black and he hated black people. However, I definitely do think he had a perception of what a criminal looked like subconsciously applied it to Martin to conclude he was suspicious. In my opinion, the best way to end these biases is for interaction between different groups of people. The conversation should be around how to can increase exposure to other ethnicities so our judgments are based on first hand experiences instead of television, word of mouth, or interactions with a small sample of a group.

While it did not become a “Stand Your Ground” case, the law also became a topic during this case. There is a lot of objection to the law. Opponents against it suggest it is giving individuals a license to kill or creating a trigger happy culture. Laws should be shield and not a sword. Floridians will have to evaluate on whether its state’s laws have become a sword for potential criminals rather than a shield for the public. Nevertheless, each state should discuss its stance on self defense. While this trial gained national attention primarily due to race, the real issue was self-defense.

My Thoughts (Matt Cargile)

Pat approached me about writing this article last week, prior to the verdict. I personally had my opinions on the case, but Pat being Pat, handles the details much better.  So who better to cover an intricate case with a lot of details. I won’t claim to know all the facts or have a complete understanding of the law in Florida.  And I think the less concerning thing is that one man went free after killing another, and more concerning is how and our reaction to such situations.  I’ll start with the how part as it’s a bit more pragmatic.  We’re a gun loving country.  To the point that the amount of guns and who has them has itself become an argument for some people to own a gun themselves.  When the result itself becomes the cause, you have to realize logic has faltered somewhere. I’m not sure if the gun laws alone allowed George Zimmerman to end someone’s life and walk free, but they certainly were a catalyst.  And as this country has deteriorated from a land of numerous and colorful opinions to that of a place with simply binary and black and white opinions, it’s hard to get anyone to debate anything without adhering to their side of the aisle first and foremost.  I say this cause I think most could agree in the one off situation, that this is not what they wish to protect when they stand to protect the right to bear arms.  But because of the fact that we think of all political debates, large and small, as bargaining chips for future debates, very few who support guns, will speak out against this.  I don’t support guns, as to me the ability to end something so precious as life with a single pull of a trigger is too heavy of a burden for any one man or woman to handle. And that’s what gets me most about this trial.  As the verdict neared I was surprised to find people who saw his acquittal as a sign of justice.  Look we can debate the law and whether he technically is innocent or not by current standards in Florida, but from a very unofficial position, can we just admit this is heinous.  That regardless of what laws and mandates say, this man still killed a young adult who was completely unarmed. That even in the worst possible scenario, even if Trayvon Martin pursued him (which isn’t what happened), and attempted to beat him up.  Even in that situation, can we all agree a gun, and more so, someone’s death can in no way be considered justice and instead should be considered quite the opposite.

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The current up and coming (flat and not really moving might be more accurate) generation isn’t the worst. Not yet at least.  We still have time, and not to worry the current champ, the Baby Boomers, are still putting up a good fight.  I’m not sure what you want to call us, generation data, generation Z (zombie??), or whatever contrived name you might think of. And yes, us, I consider myself to be apart of this up and coming generation.   But we are almost at a point of no return and I fear our mark being left on the world might be one of bastardizing social capitalism.

Let me explain.  Each generation hits a point when they’re characteristics become their historical reference.  I’m 28, with a lot friends nearing 30 or over 30, getting married, having kids, getting early divorces, etc.  Essentially, we’re grown up.  At least on paper that is.  At this point in their lives the Greatest Generation had returned home from saving the world from a massive war and were reaping the benefits of a massively growing economy that they built with their bear hands.  Times have changed obviously, and I’m not looking for my generation to miraculously save the world from a war that doesn’t exist.  I mean hell, we’ve been a part of some large social changes in our society, and continue to be one of the more open-minded generations.  So there’s already some good attributes.  But economically we’ve got a problem.

The numbers are pretty obvious that as a generation we’ve supported fiscal reform to give our system of capitalism a much-needed social conscience. This is a good thing.  I personally believe it’s important to remember that, while yes we may work hard to earn everything we receive, inevitably you got where you are by virtue of help in some way, shape or form.  For myself, sure I have a good job, with a good salary, but my parents helped with college, along with government grants, and I also received my first internship from a friend of my sister.  Have I worked hard since to succeed in my field.  Yes, of course.  But I can’t deny that my disposition on life was vastly improved to that of an inner city youth, or any other countless people less fortunate than me.  And my disposition is not an uncommon one.  And yet I fear that this effort to give our standing economic system a more socially conscious lean is not bred from pure benevolence and might actually stem from slightly selfish biases.

Maybe it’s my locale, maybe it’s luck of the draw.  Whatever it is I’ve come across a lot of peers that from my vantage point exploit these systems meant to help others.  For example when living in Crown Heights I met a girl who at the time worked for a nonprofit (good), but collected welfare (okay, I guess), and also refused a better paying job because it would put her out of the bracket that could receive  welfare and because the hours wouldn’t allow her to travel (What the…). She filled me in on some of her recent trips and honestly I can’t afford to travel that much, nor do I have the time (at least her point was logical?). To give even more context to the situation, this same girl had a Macbook, an iPhone, and a college degree that she certainly worked hard to receive but also received some help monetarily in order to do it.

This is what I call capitalizing on socialism.  And it’s also what I consider bastardizing a system put in place to help others find equal ground, and shouldn’t be used for personal gain.  Utilizing such a system for personal gain is applying a very capitalistic mindset to a social conscious (I’d say socialist, for lack of a better term here, but I’m not sure people can handle that without getting in a tiff) program.  Did I mention this same girl asked me how I felt about stealing money after I informed her I worked in the finance industry?  Well she did.

This practice is not unique.  An old roommate told me how co-workers of his would avoid certain hours in order to stay below that magical threshold to still get an EBT card.  I spotted one of those same co-workers on his way back from guitar lessons in Manhattan.  GUITAR LESSONS.  The issue is these programs have budgets like anything else.  Which means the help they can offer is finite.  Which means if you’re receiving welfare from anyone of these programs, you are limiting how much is remaining for anyone else.  This isn’t to guilt people who use these systems.  I already told you I heavily support a more socio-economically conscious government.  And therefore support these programs.  I think they can do great things for people in need and the people who truly are in need aren’t able to travel or take private guitar lessons in Manhattan trust me.  No, this is more of an issue with those taking advantage of said systems.  If you’re traveling so much you can’t work a 9 to 5, if you’re paying for private instrument lessons, if you’re buying new Apple products that just came out, or if you’re being offered decent paying jobs that you’re turning down for selfish reasons, you might be taking advantage of the system (by might, I mean definitely).  There are exceptions for all situations so I’m just speaking in generalities, but these exploits, while definitely smaller in scale, are comparable to the exploits of big business.  Again it’s not a fair comparison as I think some big financial firms have done exponentially worst things, but it doesn’t change the fact that both have the same line of thinking. “How can I take advantage of this for my personal gain? How can I capitalize on this?”

It’s not that I wish to have mindless drones that adhere to all rules without questioning the norms of society, and work tirelessly without an ounce of uniqueness to show for it.  No, we’ve already had the Baby Boomers. And It’s not that I wish to stifle the creativity of one of the most innovative generations, as we’ve certainly been a force of progression that has seen more millionaire entrepreneurs than any generation before it.  And this isn’t to say somethings shouldn’t be taken advantage of.   But if you’re “taking advantage” of what’s seemingly a fair system you’re not sticking it to the man.  No you’re only sticking it to the next person in line that may truly need it. And although our welfare programs may need much improvement, they’re not unfair systems built to line the man’s pocket with money, so taking advantage isn’t sticking it to the man.  And isn’t benefiting anyone else except yourself. I guess in the end I just hope we can continue down our path of creative renaissance, and social progression without mortgaging our ethics or morals, or mortgaging it on the backs of those less fortunate than us and definitely more in need.  No, the wealthy and big business already have that role perfected.  We should strive to reach our utmost potential. It’s only thing we owe this world.  And somehow I just can’t see a bright girl, with a college degree working minimal hours so she can go to concert festivals and yoga getaways, as someone reaching their full potential.

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Score: 10/10

Freaknomoics (2005) and its sequel Super Freakonomics (2009) are collaborations between University of Chicago economist Steven D. Levitt and author and New York Times journalist Stephen Dubner.   I could not stop reading either of the books. They are great because they are quirky, provocative, yet are intelligent enough to force you to look at and perceive something in a way you normally would not. An example of all these elements occurred when I was reading Freakonomics on the subway on my way to work. I was reading the chapter about socioeconomic patterns of naming children. Specifically, I was reading the pages going over common names for each ethnicity group and how names are cyclical in nature and reused. As I was reading that chapter, I was dreading someone taking a glance at what I was reading, taking it out of context, and thinking I was a racist. When I got to the pages about common Caucasian names, another passenger tapped me on the shoulder and said “Excuse Me”. At that moment, I thought the worst of my fears have come true. He was going to tell me how offended he is and I may even get into a fight on the subway. To my relief, he smiled and said “I was reading it and I have to say, they [authors of Freaknonomics] really know us pretty well”. That reaction sums up the greatness of these two books. They take a look at the world in a unique manner that may be a little weird and on the brink of being offensive. However, when you take a look at it from their perspective, you say to yourself, “Interesting. I never looked at it like that. There is a lot of truth to it.” As such, I highly recommend both books if you want to have fun having your mind mesmerized.

The unifying theme of Freakonomics and Super Freakonomics is how incentives influence decisions and behaviors. However, another theme in the books is that the most popular and obvious answers may not be the actual or best answers. This point is illustrated by an orange interior for an apple on the cover of Freakonomics and an exploding orange apple on the cover of Super Freaknomics. Below are some of the most interesting chapters of both books that illustrate those themes.

1.  Israeli day care

An Israeli day care in Haifa, Israel was having trouble with parents picking up their children on time. In order to give an incentive for parents, the day care fined the parents $3 for each incident in which they picked up their children late. However, the number of tardy parents actually increased due to the implementation of the fine. The fine was unsuccessful for a couple of reasons outside of the most obvious answer that the fine was too small. First, the parents could pay $3 to get rid of their guilt. Next, the small fine signaled to the parents that the tardiness was not that big of a deal. (Freakonomics 15-20)

The first important part of this experiment is that aligning incentives with desired behaviors is very important and not straightforward. In the case of the day care, the fine did not create the preferred result because it was a small price to pay for the extra service. Before the fine was implemented, the parents may have felt a moral obligation to pick their children up on time to avoid guilt from forcing the day care to watch their kids without compensation. However, the fine can be viewed as compensation. Since it is very small, it actually is an incentive to be late because the parents will feel the day care is being paid for the extra time and that pay is minimal and thus acceptable to the parents.

Another important part of the experiment is signaling. In this case, the incentive was not in line with the motivation of the day care. As a result, it also sent the wrong signal to the parents that the tardiness was not a serious problem. Once that message was sent, it could not be taken back. In this situation, the removal of the fine did not lower the late pickups back to the levels before it was in place as the signal was already delivered to the parents that it was no big deal to be late. As one could see, poor incentives can hurt instead of help a situation. Consequently, ensuring that incentives are properly aligned with the wanted outcome is critical.

2. Chicago School Teachers

The Chicago Public School system started high stakes test taking in 1996. Moreover, President Bush’s No Child Left Behind law mandated high-stakes testing. In this system, students need to obtain a minimum score on a standardized test before advancing to the next grade. In addition, teachers could be penalized for poor scores as they could be censured or passed over for a raise or promotion. If a school does poorly, federal funding can be withheld. For those reasons, teaches have incentive to cheat because of the system. As it is also difficult to catch cheaters, there is also a lack of incentive not to cheat. The authors also devised a system to catch cheaters by understanding how one would cheat. They realized that cheaters only had a short amount of time to commit the crime. As a result, the most effective form of cheating would be to change a row of answers for as many tests as possible. Based on this knowledge, they were able to create an algorithm to look for these patterns and catch the cheaters. (Freakonomics 22-30)

While the idea of compensating good teachers and getting rid of lousy teachers is a good idea, No Child Left Behind and high stake testing is a lousy method to try to accomplish those goals. Having one standardized test per year to gauge teachers is a terrible idea. It forces teachers to teach to one standardized tests. The best teachers I have had in the past are the ones that challenge how their students think and can bring more to students than the standard knowledge base. By measuring teachers based on how well their students perform on a standardized test, it creates an incentive for teachers to ensure that the students know the material for the test but nothing more than is covered by the test. The best way to gauge teachers is to quantify how their students perform in the future. However, properly assessing educators through this method would take time and money. In a world where the most immediate and cheapest solutions are valued more than effective solutions, high stake testing emerged as the lousy quick fix. Moreover, as most teachers feel it is an unfair system, it creates an attitude that it is fine to cheat the system.

The second part of the study was related to developing a method to catch the cheaters. Understanding the incentives to cheat and thinking like a cheater, the authors were able to identify cheaters. Based on the algorithm, the Chicago public school system was able to re-test the classes of suspected teachers with independent test administrators. Based on this process, the school system could verify that the teachers cheated as the classes performed significantly poorer when the teachers did not administer the test. This part of the study is similar to game theory. First, you need to understand the incentives of your competition. Next, you need to understand how your competition can beat or cheat you. Once you figure out this information, you can develop strategies to prevent your competition from cheating or to outperform them.

3. Roe v. Wade and the Legalization of Abortion as the Reason for Reduced Crime

There have been many explanations for the decrease in crime rates that include innovative police strategies, more prisons, changes in crack and other drug markets, aging of the population, tougher gun-control laws, a strong economy, and increased number of police. However, many of these reasons could be results of increased crime rather than the cause of decreased crime. Freakonomics presented an original explanation: the legalization of abortion by Roe v. Wade eliminated many of the candidates who would become criminals and crime decreased when those aborted fetuses would have been adult criminals. Based on data from the study, there was strong evidence supporting the thesis as states with higher abortion rates had the greatest decrease in crime rates. (Freakonomics 119-141)

This case was the best example of how the most popular answers are not always the best answers. When politicians pointed out the standard reasons for a decrease in crime, they made the reasons appear obvious as they identified new incentives not to commit crime. However, abortion was never addressed until Freakonomics, whether it was not obvious or politically unwise to do so. While it may be controversial, Freakonomics presents a lot of logic in its argument. The other reasons appear more like responses to the problem and not the solution after reviewing the logic in Freakonomics. Abortion is the only reason that directly reduces the supply of criminals. Strong and wealthier families are not likely to have abortions because accidental pregnancies are less likely since they can afford birth control easier, pregnancies are planned, and they have the money to support the child with a decent lifestyle which includes a good education. Abortions are more likely to be used by poorer individuals with criminal backgrounds and who would thus be more likely to raise a criminal adult. Whether someone believes abortions are moral or not, it may have had a direct effect on reducing the number of criminals.

4. Why Should Suicide Bombers Buy Life Insurance?

Algorithms are being used by countries to find terrorists. Algorithms look for positive indicators such as owning a cell phone, being a student, and renting rather than owning a home. Negative indicators include having a savings account, withdrawing money from an ATM on a Friday afternoon, and buying life insurance. As insurance companies do not pay out insurance to policyholders for suicide, a person who is planning on blowing themselves up would not buy insurance. As a result, a potential terrorist could cover his tracks by buying life insurance. (SuperFreakonomics 93-94)

This idea is also related to game theory. If you know what your opponent is looking for to identify you or reveal your intentions, you can send them a fake signal to throw them off. For example, in business, you could send false signals to your competition in order to throw them off your business strategy. In addition, baseball is a good example. Every offseason, teams bid for free agents.  A baseball team could send some fake signals to its competitors that it is pursuing a free agent when it actually has no interest. This tactic is used to bait competition into overpaying for a particular player.

5. What do Al Gore and Mount Pinatubo have in Common?

This section challenges the most popular idea to fight global warming: carbon credits. First, livestock such as cows and sheep produce 50% more greenhouse gas than transportation.  Next, establishing carbon credits in the United States will be irrelevant as China and India grow and emit far more carbon emissions than could possibly be reduced in the United States. As a result, SuperFreakonomics presents a novel solution. The eruption of Mount Pinatubo emitted 20 million tons of sulfur dioxide. The resulting haze protected the region with a sort of sunscreen that cooled the region. As it will be difficult to convince China and India to reduce emissions as it would hurt their growth, SuperFreaknomics suggests emitting chemicals in the air to create a similar shield to cool the Earth. (SuperFreakonomics 167-203)

While I do not know whether a shield would work, the carbon credits will not create enough of an impact on global warming. Creating a market for companies to buy the right to pollute is not a great solution. The market will not magically solve the situation especially when China and India would dwarf any positive effect with negative effects. However, global warming is a big enough problem to warrant the exploration of other options instead of jumping on the bandwagon of the first solution with a catchy slogan.

Those chapters are only a small sample of the unique topics Levitt and Dubner touch upon. They also cover their unique perspectives on matters such as the economics of drug dealing, sumo wrestlers, whether there is a direct effect of parenting on education, patriotic prostitutes, etc.  Whether you agree with their conclusions or not, they are very thought provoking and entertaining.

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Where’s the outrage?

The news media is atwitter with the revelation that the NSA is keeping tabs on all us honest hard-working Americans. And, to hear them tell it, it’s a political shit storm of umbrage. Americans are furious that their elected leaders would not only invade their privacy, but would do so on such a grand scale. Or so, once again, the media would like to have us believe. The problem with their story is a simple one. No one cares.

Oh sure, we all know that we should be outraged by the revelation. We all know that we should be terrified that the big brother prophesied in ‘1984’ is presenting himself before our eyes. We should put our feet down and take action to prevent this situation from escalating. We’re not going to, of course. We just know that we should.

What’s everyone’s problem? Why aren’t we as upset as we really should be (present company included)? I’ll answer that with an anecdote.

As anyone who at one point or another tried to friend a celebrity on any social media platform knows, it’s extremely difficult to make contact with popular personalities. If you have a public persona, there are tons of safe guards to not only prevent others from getting in touch with you, but to hide your very existence unless you are on the same level of general popularity. So, when a well-regarded, popular, and public TED speaker showed up on my LinkedIn “People you might know” suggestions, you could understand that I was more than a little surprised. We have never worked together in any professional capacity. Why would LinkedIn suggest us?

Truth be told, we were not total strangers. This woman and I once flirted on the subway on our way to Brooklyn. I had no idea who she was at the time, and she gave me her email address after our interaction. I sent her a polite invitation to a drink and she sent me a polite but firm rejection. C’est la vie. That was our only interaction. Ever. Yet, here she was on my list of possible contacts. The only way for LinkedIn to know that I knew her was for Gmail to be sharing my personal information with them. Since they’re both owned by Google, whats a little invasion of privacy amongst friendly companies.

The world as a whole is already in the process of surrendering its privacy. The prevalence of location specific technologies and personalized software has gone a long way to making our digital thumbprint easier to identify. Cloud based memory systems keep lots of our deepest secrets out in the ethers rather sequestered away. The idea that you can physically find someone from their digital activity is less the horrors of cyberpunk fiction and more the reality of a check-in to get a free drink. You can tell by the spam you get what websites you’ve been visiting and you never even had to sign into them.

Perhaps it’s because we’re a capitalist society that we understand all this privacy invasion from a corporate standpoint. They are trying to sell us products and will stop at nothing to make their dollar. The point is, we’re already used to being spied on. The idea that we’re ‘shocked’ by the revelation that the government is tracking our phone calls is insulting if for no other reason than the story already broke six years ago under Bush. It could be that the media thinks this is a story because Obama was supposed to be the president of change on now he’s making a wrestler like heel turn and keeping this wicked program going. The truth is, however, much sadder.

It’s in every government’s interest to keep the program going. Being able to keep track of your populace is the most important tool in governance. From keeping them safe, to keeping them suppressed, the ability to consistently view your people both and groups and personally is far too useful to ever give up. And they are never going to. From here on out, we are always going to be a society on camera.

Why aren’t we outraged that we’re being spied on? Sadly, because we are getting used to it.

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