Category: Pop Culture

Shareable economy

“Shareable economy” and “the new mutualism” are new and trendy terms for new-fashioned things like bikesharing programs, coworking, hacker spaces, etc. — and also names for old-fashioned things like public libraries, public parks, credit unions, co-ops, etc.

Two blogs on the shareable economy that seem worth reading:

Shareable

OuiShare

Both blogs encourage social entrepreneurship. Both blogs look beyond North America to Europe, South America, Australia, and beyond. Not sure I’d read either blog on a regular basis, but both are worth looking at for ideas at least once.

The real America

In his 1994 introduction to his 1981 novel Hello, America, J. G. Ballard writes: “The United States has given birth to most of our century’s dreams, and to a good many of its nightmares. No other country has created such a potent vision of itself, and exported that vision so successfully to the rest of the world…. Whenever I visit the United States I often feel that the real ‘America’ lies not in the streets of Manhattan or Chicago, or the farm towns of the mid-west, but in the imaginary America created by Hollywood and the media landscape.”

The real America is the imaginary America which is presented in pop culture; this makes sense to me. And this raises a question for me: should religion accommodate to this imaginary America, as for example Rick Warren and his version of the prosperity gospel do? — or should religion take pains to point out that the “real America” is really an imaginary America? — or should religion ignore altogether the problems caused by the imaginary America being the real America? Or put more starkly: should religion resist pop culture, or embrace it?

I think they did it again…

“Oops, I Did It Again,” a song written by Max Martin and Rami Yacoub, has gotten a bad reputation. In an introduction to his own version of the song, Richard Thompson says that unfortunately, the best-known performance of the song was done by “a rather crass pop artist”; yet, Thompson says, the song itself is lovely, with a chord structure “reminiscent of other centuries,” and “if we just take it out of the original hands, and give it a slightly different interpretation, … we can reveal its splendor.” 1”

Since this is such a splendid song, it seems a prime candidate for adaptation: instead of a song addressed to a confused lover, why not make it into a song addressed to some of the people who are behind the growing economic inequality in the U.S.?

Oops, They Did It Again

I think they did it again,
They made us believe
That they were our friends.
Oh, baby,
They might think act like they care
But it doesn’t mean
That they’re serious;
‘Cause to make empty promises
That is just what CEOs do.
Oh, baby, baby —

Oops, they did it again,
They played with our hearts,
To them it’s a game.
Oh, baby, baby,
Oops, they cut back our pay,
Took benefits away;
They’re not so innocent! Continue reading “I think they did it again…”

Homework

If you haven’t yet seen it, I recommend an article in the October, 2013, issue of Atlantic magazine.

The article is titled “My Daughter’s Homework Is Killing Me.” For one week, the author does homework alongside his 13 year old daughter — and it’s more work than he bargained for. The author finds he has doubts about whether the homework is worth spending so much time on, and he also cites studies that claim there is little correlation between the amount of homework and academic performance. Also of interest — the author says that the amount of homework increases and decreases in a 30 year cycle, and we are currently at the peak of heavy homework. You can read this article online here.

I was interested in this article because I often hear from kids in middle school and high school how overwhelmed they are by the amount of homework they have. Of course, from my point of view as a religious educator, I care less about academic performance than about whether kids are growing up to be ethical, sensitive, and caring human beings — and as far as I know, homework has not helped kids become more ethical, sensitive, and caring. But I have definitely noticed that kids are getting more homework now than, say, a decade ago.

I wonder what you think about homework — especially those of you who are parents of middle school and high school students. Are kids getting too much homework these days? Do you think kids need lots of homework in order to remain competitive in today’s academic environment? How is homework affecting their lives — and your life as a parent? I’d love to hear from you!

Originally posted here.

Down by the docks

This afternoon, I went down to the marina, and stood on one of the docks. Plodding along the dock came a tall, strong, heavy man with a tarry pigtail falling over the shoulder of his soiled blue coat, muttering under his breath and occasionally breaking out into song:

  Fifteen men on the dead man’s chest,
      Yo, ho, ho, and a bottle of rum…

He sang in a high, old tottering voice that sounded like it had been tuned and broken at the capstan bars. As he came closer, I could see a scar across one cheek, an old sabre cut that now showed a dirty, livid white on his nut-brown face. Continue reading “Down by the docks”

Independence Day, Acton, Mass.

Independence Day in Acton, Massachusetts: It was blazing hot and the sky was a perfect New England blue with a few clouds. We went to Nara Park. The chair of the Board of Selectmen read a proclamation. Someone read the Gettysburg Address, then a color guard in Civil War uniforms fired their rifles. I ate a pulled pork sandwich I got from the Lions, Abby had fried chicken from a food truck, Jim ate a hotdog, Carol ate some of my potato chips. A Beatles cover band played. We left before the fireworks so we could sit in Abby and Jim’s living room and watch “Little Britain.” We went to bed late.

BlogJul0413

Above: Independence Day sunset, Acton, Mass.

What squirrels want

As we walked past the little plum tree this morning, heading towards the car to drive to the church, Carol pointed to the ripe plums that lay on the ground. “The squirrels have been getting to them,” she said.

“You know what I’m going to say,” I said.

“What?” she said, somewhat warily.

“Squirrels just want to have plums,” I said.*

Despite herself, Carol laughed.

We got into the car, and she began singing, “And squirrels they want to have plu–ums / Oh, squirrels just want to have plums….”

———

*If you were lucky enough to miss the popular music of the 1980s, that’s a reference to a 1983 hit song, with vaguely feminist lyrics, performed by Cyndi Lauper.

Have Yourself a Buy Nothing Christmas

Yes, it’s not too early to start planning for Christmas. More specifically, it’s not too early to start planning if you want to have a Buy Nothing Christmas. A bunch of Canadian Mennonites have been promoting this concept through this Web site, and this Facebook page.

I like them because they’re not afraid to tell the truth about Christmas consumption as they see it, yet they’re not sanctimonious about it. And they play ukuleles in the snow. And they have funny posters.

Geez, how did I miss this?

Geez magazine: Holy Mischief in an Age of Fast Faith — they’ve been around since 2005, and how could I have not heard of them before? Maybe because they’re Canadian, and even though I’m a Canadiophile, there’s enormous cultural resistance here in the States which tends to prevent the in-migration of culture from north of the border. All kinds of good things to read, including stories and blog posts like Reduce, reuse, repent: Earth Day tent revival — A dash of cold water for Christian anarchism — Choice and capitalism: A lesson from ecological Marxism.

Good stuff. You might want to check it out. And thanks, James, for turning me on to Geez.

Maker Faire and lobsters

Carol and I went to Maker Faire today. It was held just a couple of miles away in San Mateo, so we were able to walk there — which was good, because so many people attended that some of the parking lots were four miles away from the event. If you’ve never heard of it, Maker Faire is kind of like a state or county agricultural fair for geeks and engineers.

We saw the gee-whiz showy things you’d expect to see at Maker Faire: strange metal constructions that belched fire; all kinds of robots; people riding around inside giant self-propelled cupcakes; a Rube Goldberg-style giant mousetrap powered by simple machines and a bowling ball; the CO2 eruptions that happen when you drop Mentos into carbonated beverages. My favorite gee-whiz showy thing was the Sashimi Tabernacle Choir, an art car covered with fish and lobsters that danced in carefully choreographed movements:

BlogMay1813

And we saw the geeky technical things you’d expect to see at Maker Faire: conventional automobiles converted to electric power; too many projects made with Arduino microcontrollers; robots; drones; giant soap bubbles; a blacksmith; ham radio operators.

We also saw things that you might not expect at Maker faire: goats; chickens; beekeepers; a guy selling New-Agey devices to protect you from EMF radiation; a steam-powered scale-model train; lessons on how to walk on stilts; a really good drummer who used plastic trash barrels and other found objects for his drum set.

It was very satisfying, if for no other reason than being able to spend time hanging out with thousands of other geeky people who like to make things instead of consuming things.

Update: Because a commenter asked, here’s a video (taken by Carol) of the Sashimi Tabernacle Choir: