Police Culture

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The mariner is befuddled by the response to confrontation between a policeman and any adversary, that is, kill/harm first, ask questions later. While the conflict between races receives news coverage, it is more than race. It is a different attitude primarily by the policeman but includes an expectation by adversaries that in any confrontation one may be killed and therefore a defensive attitude escalates the situation.

When the mariner was a youngster, a policeman had a walking route in neighborhoods with retail centers. The policeman knew shop owners, would check alleys, visit with citizens on their stoops (A Baltimore term for front steps) and generally knew who the troublemakers were and where they lurked. The attitude of the policeman was not assaultive by nature. Is this just a Norman Rockwell moment? No, it actually was that way sixty years ago.

What elements of our culture changed so much that the role of policemen became a civilian National Guard complete with armor, military vehicles, military cannons and other heavy ordnance, and a strike force mentality.

Perhaps it was many things.

More individuals are able to purchase guns simply because all forms of retail (legal and illegal) move more rapidly today than sixty years ago. Further, the weapons are no longer 22 And 38 pistols but automatic weapons, explosives, and the ability to organize criminal events via cell phones and social platforms on the Internet.

Crime used to be a nationally based issue, for example, the mob and extended crime families. Today, crime is an international issue dealing with drugs from many countries using elaborate armies of mobsters similar to those in Mexico and South America with arsenals and strike capability better than many nations. Stateside criminals receive indirect armament and intelligence from international syndicates – it must be said that arms manufacturers are a source and fight mightily through the National Rifle Association (NRA) to block any legislation related to types of arms and registration.

To help cover law enforcement budgets, the Federal Government provided to law enforcement “no strings” grants through its Community Oriented Police Services (COPS) program. Without direct oversight, heavy armament and riot equipment was purchased far beyond the need of any law enforcement agency. It must be a macho thing for a small city police department to own an Abrams battle tank. Obviously, police departments chose overkill to overstaffing.

It always has been the case that a policeman is trained to quickly stop a threatening confrontation. Years ago, when the mariner worked with police training academies, emptying a pistol was not the first solution – as it appears to be today. Even allowing the use of techniques that would quickly kill an assailant was not routinely encouraged. The example being the strangle hold on Eric Garner in New York where Garner died in the process. The mariner is puzzled that the Grand Jury did not vote for a trial in this case. The video and the Medical Examiner’s report clearly presented arguable information.

Nevertheless, each incident clarifies that the role of a policeman has changed from maintaining social order to inciting social disorder in the last several killings that have made the news in such a short time.

Guns of any kind are too easy to acquire and underlie incidents from mass murders in schools and religious institutions, to robberies ending in unnecessary gun killings.

Those who want to satisfy fear in their personal lives have run out to purchase their own guns. While emotionally gratifying, more guns in anyone’s hands only acerbates conflict that ends in unnecessary killing and wounding of people. Truly horrific and emotional documentation abounds. The issue is to straighten out the cultural and legal rules that govern our society. Perhaps we need controlled access to weapons and more policemen who want to manage peace with conversation rather than incite conflict and fear.

Ancient Mariner

 

Oneness V

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Lacking Compassion, is there another way?

Measuring the Outcome

Mediation and Arbitration

Measuring the Outcome. Through the ages, many have negotiated deals that were worth good profit because they gave away something that the other party wanted and was willing to pay a price to acquire. Until money dominated commerce, buyers and sellers had a culture that allowed for barter, which is dickering about the comparative worth of two commodities. True, it was awkward to carry a sheep around or three bales of timothy hay, but everyone was in on setting the price. Those were the good old days. Today, a customer pays a price set by the seller. It is uncommon to dicker about dollars unless one is engaged in stocks, bonds and commodities – which is limited to those who do not need to barter for basic necessities. If a farmer wanted to sell a sheep on the open market today, much of the profit is already taken by a commodities trader who may never have seen a sheep.

It used to be that business and labor would sit down and dicker, each side knowing the financial status of the company. In one example, the business negotiating team was under severe orders not to grant more than a two cent per hour raise. The labor negotiating team had its members clamoring for ten cents an hour. After three weeks at the negotiating table, the final result was: the union received a two cent raise. However, labor also received a four-week vacation instead of two and was allowed to accumulate sick leave. The solution was a two cent raise to please the bosses and the equivalent of a ten cent raise for the union members. It’s all in how one measures things. There is no doubt the process improved oneness in the company.

Measuring the outcome requires that two elements be in place: those involved are using the same measuring stick – one of the big reasons money became a standard; the other is respect for the measuring process. With these two items in place, it is possible to reconcile differences even if there is no compassion. It may not be easy but it can be done.

In recent years, airline companies have received a bad reputation because some airlines did not want to measure the outcome with the union’s help. Some airlines declared bankruptcy, which negated labor contracts that were in place. Weeks later, when the bankruptcy court agreed to a method for emerging from bankruptcy, the employees were at the mercy of the airline if they wanted to keep their jobs. This is an example of not agreeing about how to measure outcomes. Another failure to use the same measures for outcome led to heated reactions by US citizenry when in 2008 banks that caused a severe recession were not allowed to fail and the citizenry was furious when large bonuses were paid to bank traders. Behind the scenes, the Federal Government and the banks were dickering and making deals about who would fail and who would pay fines. The Government actually ended up owning bank stock as a guarantee. For lack of agreed measuring, this situation is still unresolved in the citizens’ minds six years later.

Mediation and arbitration are controlled dickering. This is accomplished by using a third party to oversee the negotiation. A good example is when Egypt attempted to mediate a compromise between Gaza and Israel. The mediation will not work for two reasons: neither Gaza (Hamas) nor Israel want to use the same values by which to measure the outcome; neither Gaza nor Israel perceive a greater reality. Oneness, even by an uncompassionate process, is out of the question.

Having an arbiter or judge decide the outcome of a conflict inevitably leaves one party or the other, or both parties, unsatisfied. Granted there are times when two parties will never accept a common measure of outcome; neither will accept the arbiter’s measure of outcome. While forcing a conclusion to an unstable situation, the difficulty with mediation and arbitration is that the methods generally do not build oneness.

Conflicts that find themselves in court inevitably enter a win-lose environment. While negotiation may take place within the court process, the win-lose environment remains. Constricted by legal procedures, empathy and compassion are not players. One may make the case that courts expedite irresolvable situations, for example divorce or property conflicts. Still, these arrangements are self serving and do not encourage the union of lesser and greater realities based on compassion and oneness.

The question: You may be familiar with this situation and may already know the act of compassion. You and a friend have one doughnut to share. What is the best procedure to assure the doughnut is equally shared? Think about your combined feelings of trust and fairness that were necessary. Which feeling was stronger?

Ancient Mariner

The Matrix

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Some readers sought an understanding as to why the mariner uses the movie The Matrix as an allegory in several posts where government or corporations are the theme. All the information you would like to know about the movie, a trilogy, can be found at

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Matrix#Philosophical_influences .

An exegesis: many years ago, computer networks and robots took over the world. Humans fought back by making the atmosphere permanently full of storm clouds, denying the Sun as a source of energy. In turn, the robots began breeding human beings as a source of energy, AKA human batteries that were kept alive in casket-like pods. These humans were fed a false reality such that they believed they were living normal lives as their ancestors had done. This false reality is called the Matrix. A small team of free humans fight to destroy the Matrix in typical science fiction manner. The trilogy is an entertaining set of movies to watch.

The idea of a “false realty” goes far back in history and encompasses many theoretical speculations that the world we engage in is not real but rather a figment of our imagination and greatly limited by our five paltry senses.

The mariner uses the “human battery” as an example that represents when citizens are ignored or impugned upon in favor of profit or false political authority rather than to be properly represented by our governments and corporations.

Perhaps most memorable was his reference to candidate Romney when he derided behind closed doors that 47% of American citizens were nothing but overhead (Oneness IV):

The 2012 presidential race caught candidate Romney admitting that forty-seven percent of the US population depended on government handouts. It was spoken with derision and contempt….. The woes of a beaten middle class would not be an element of reconciliation between lesser and greater realities. There is no act of compassion. To Romney and the attendees in that room, people are Matrix batteries.

During the 2014 election, it was obvious that gerrymandering had achieved the same effect making the majority of the population irrelevant – more or less batteries. While national polls showed 80-90% of the population preferred taking automatic weapons off the street, candidates were elected across the board that would defend gun rights to include not only weapons but armored vehicles and rocket launchers.

To counter the Matrix effect, we need only to rise up as citizens and demand two changes:

Remove census redistricting from party domination and gerrymandering.

Impose a term limit election rule that no candidate may run for public office if the term in question extends beyond the candidate’s sixtieth birthday.

The term limit issue is not as irrational as one may expect. What is the average age of all citizens? At what age does current culture and experience begin to pass by an elected official? We need only to look at the Supreme Court to see the damage outdated and myopic judgment can cause.

Ancient Mariner

 

Self Serving Utterances

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Today’s topic is doublespeak. Doublespeak is designed not only to confuse or fool others but one’s self as well. For example, it is common for an individual to speak of themselves as “fiscally conservative and socially liberal.” This phrase feels comforting; one feels that one is up-to-date on the political tone of the times. Actually the phrase is an oxymoron. One need only say, “Put your money where your mouth is” and the fallacy reveals itself. A fiscal conservative foremost will defend the need for fiscal worth and likely will not trade that for social responsibility.

Another form of doublespeak is “do as I say, not as I do.” There are many examples. An example from the left this time, an advocate of animal rights will decry the practices of sow birthing cages and beef veal pens while enjoying their pork or veal cutlet. From the right, one advocates freedom of religion but denies that freedom to anyone who may not support their perception of religious practice.

Then there is the doublespeak professional – the politician. The late night talk shows, including FOX, NBC, CBS, ABC, Comedy Central and MSNBC, had a field day with candidate policy positions before a primary and afterward. The republicans had to win the primary within extremely gerrymandered districts where the tea party held sway. If they won their primary, the candidate shifted their remarks toward the center to garner as many remaining votes as possible.

The same tactic revealed itself in politicians who decried President Obama’s policies while supporting the same legislation under President Bush. One exception is the proposed immigration reform by both Presidents that was not accepted by Congress in either administration.

The last form of doublespeak today is false advocacy. The most virulent form is the negative campaign advertisement. A candidate espouses an implied but unexplained position on policy by talking about an opponent’s errant ways. Debating in this way permits the candidate to do whatever he wants without defending his or her own policy declarations.

False advocacy is used by the individual citizen in daily conversation when the individual disagrees with another individual but will not express that disagreement. Instead, at best, a statement of faint praise is offered but clearly there is no intention of supporting the other individual. The second individual must be keen on body language to know the person does not mean what they say and is in opposition.

It is no wonder one is encouraged not to speak of politics or religion. One of the mariner’s longstanding friends is a staunch conservative. The friend knows the mariner is, well, all over the place. We never speak of fiscal or social issues which is a shame; the utterances would be self serving but even more destructive to a good friendship. It was in the post “Oneness IV” where the mariner suggested that the reader pick one of the people you know that you have difficulty relating to because of your opinion of that person. Imagine that person without letting your opinion affect you. This takes a lot of practice. You know you are doing the right thing if you can feel a growing empathy. This is an exercise coined in the phrase “walk a mile in his shoes.” What are the good characteristics that you noticed?

As a parting thought, the advocacy for freedom of religion seemed to be a “do as I say, not as I do” form of doublespeak. Does the same apply to “one person, one vote?” Is the US indeed a democracy?

Ancient Mariner

 

Oneness – IV

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ONENESS – IV

Which lesser reality?

Which greater reality?

One need think only a moment before a conflict comes to mind: How does one select the appropriate lesser solution? The reader is reminded at this point that empathy is a tool with which to make the best decision. In the example of the owner of a small business, the owner actually has several options: Layoff? Sell the business? Go into debt? Restructure the business in a way that maximizes short term profit? How does one select a lesser solution that maximizes the opportunity to select a correct greater solution?

This is no easy consideration as any individual will attest. In the example, consideration begins deep in the philosophy of the owner. Is profit, his religion, his character, the definition of who he is? Is his measure of personal worth his obligation to others – if only to his kind or his business? Is his measure compassion? Have we come to a root that solves the dilemma? Is it the act of compassion?

Compassion deserves further investigation. It is not a strong objective in global awareness. The link between lesser and greater realities almost always is a compassionate consideration and suffers mightily from self interest and the predatory nature of the human species.

If one examines prejudicial behavior, particularly racism and religious prejudice, the smaller situation is a matter of conditioning rather than thoughtful consideration. Racist and religious behavior may be inculcated by parents. Perhaps peer pressure is the source of prejudice. It may be that people of color simply are a scapegoat for personal feelings of inadequacy. Confronted with an interracial or religious situation, how does the person find empathy required to select the appropriate lesser reality? Even if they found empathy, could they select the greater reality?

Many years ago, the mariner had a conversation with a racist man. His position was that African Americans, Latinos and Chinese all looked different than he did and, conversely, he looked different to them. This turned out to be a telling point. “What,” he said, “if they became the majority of the population? I would no longer be part of the majority and my normal white privileges would disappear.”

Is this man able to find sympathy or to act with compassion involving nonwhite individuals? If so, it will take a mighty wind of change.

Prejudice is not limited to race or religion. The author knows a number of individuals who are so opposed to smoking that friends and events first must be tobacco free. Then more compassionate behavior may arise. Confronted with a situation involving tobacco, how does the individual select the correct reality which will link to a greater, compassionate reality?

One solution is to ignore that which is offensive. It takes practice to hone one’s mind to accept the person first – despite the automatic rejections of race, alcoholism, smoking, or whether a person is neat and clean, has a job or makes as much money such that the person is a credible member of the human race. The 2012 presidential race caught candidate Romney admitting that forty-seven percent of the US population depended on government handouts. It was spoken with derision and contempt. Where was the seed of empathy that is necessary to link a lesser and greater reality? Without empathy, Romney was unable to perceive the dependency of banks and industries on government handouts, tax breaks and loopholes. The woes of a beaten middle class would not be an element of reconciliation between lesser and greater realities. There is no act of compassion. To Romney and the attendees in that room, people are Matrix batteries.

Science has a theory that all things in the universe are entropic. The mariner suggests that oneness can induce growth, depending on oneness as part of a resolution. In other words, an act of compassion expands orderliness, consciousness, and discovery while negative acts accelerate entropy.

The question: Pick one of the people you know that you have difficulty relating to because of your opinion of that person. Imagine that person without letting your opinion affect you. This takes a lot of practice. You know you are doing the right thing if you can feel a growing empathy. This is an exercise coined in the phrase “walk a mile in his shoes.” What are the good characteristics that you noticed? Can you separate your smaller situation and the person’s larger situation enough to reconcile the difference? What act of compassion will be required?

Ancient Mariner

The Wrong God

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The mariner is in the middle of a series suggesting oneness is a tool to help make good decisions. Even as he writes, retail giants and smaller chains alike have decided to extend black Friday back to the morning of Thanksgiving Day. This means workers will not enjoy a moment of celebration of family, a break from the stresses of a capitalist-driven world. Kudos to some corporations who will not intrude on the holiday. These companies deliberately stand for a culture that recognizes a world beyond pursuit of the almighty dollar.

In past posts, the mariner has touched on the subject of slavery as an evolutionary process. Splitting of parents and children is no longer de rigueur – if one doesn’t include immigration policy of the United States. Likewise, it is not legal to prevent employees from leaving their corporate family – or is it? With salaries that have been stagnant since the 1980’s, few families have the resources to move, sustain themselves long enough to find a decent job, or even attend night classes to improve their education.

As slaves were given minimal rations and poor housing, it is no better today. There are vast neighborhoods in American cities where joblessness is around 25% – 30%, the homes are in disrepair and, as in Detroit, utilities are shut off because the Detroit and Michigan governments have failed to represent these oppressed neighborhoods. The likely fault lies in racism, elitism, and especially gerrymandering. These neighborhoods are full of slaves, are mistreated like slaves and, ironically, even today separate parents and children because a whole family cannot live on food stamps or a meager income by the father which forces him to leave his family so that the family can qualify for welfare.

Still, there was an opportunity to glean even more from those who had poor paying jobs. Banks and mortgage companies misrepresented the cost of buying a home – such a basic need for the lower working class – knowing that later balloon payments would be beyond the income of the borrowers. This resulted in the economic collapse of 2008 and the ruin of financial security for millions of families. Still, the banks made billions of dollars and walked away from this crime on humanity without one prison sentence, not even one trial.

And now corporate greed is taking away the most sacrosanct holiday for families: Thanksgiving.

Is this the work of God?

Is this the work of greed?

Certainly oneness was not used to make decisions about the wellbeing of the greater reality – the need of millions of workers to be normal, family-based human beings.

Ancient Mariner

 

Oneness III

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ONENESS III

Oneness is overwhelmed

All religions have language that relates to morality and godliness. These words have been a mainstay for billions of people since the Egyptian pyramids were built. Slowly, exceptional writings were gathered to capture the wisdom of good works – works that improved a situation for all concerned but also improved reality in general, works that over time would sustain an ameliorative society. Ritual and theological differences aside, these works are the foundation of oneness. Often, however, these works lack the nature of a how-to book; how to get from slot A to Tab A may not be clear.

Throughout history, there are times when society suffers a wrenching change in values. These changes are caused by dramatic transitions in population, invention, and discovery that turn society topsy-turvy. Quick examples are gunpowder, the wheel, the sail, automobiles, airplanes, steam, nationalist conflict, television, financial opportunism, and the Internet. Today, the pressures of change erupt in every quarter from what to eat, to communications, to starving masses, to obsolete national boundaries to oligarchy – both governmental and corporate and exposure to unending wars around the globe.

Unlike the past, however, the eruption is world-wide. No country is exempt from global opportunism, global warming, global population growth and shrinking global resources of which physical space is one. Many countries still live by cultures created many centuries ago. Many countries are artificial – carved by war and politics instead of natural social development. Many still live primitively in deep jungles or on distant islands. All will feel the eruption of the twenty-first century. Our technological capabilities expose us to global awareness that overwhelms our personal, every day values.

Increasingly visible is the global reorganization of super powers and global economic contests – if not wars. The challenge is to find something that will work on any scale. By nature, oneness is personal. Can oneness become global?

Oneness is at the mercy of circumstance. One cannot mandate that selfishness is not permitted; one cannot use force to reduce forceful behavior; one cannot deny greed by redistribution of ill-gotten gains.

Alexander McCall Smith has written a series of books centered on the character Isabel Dalhousie. Dalhousie is a detective prone to philosophical thoughts. In The Careful Use of Compliments[1], there is a passage related to the examination of community oneness:

“Cat went off to prepare Isabel’s lunch, leaving her with The Guardian. She was reading an article on the Middle East and the prospects for peace, which were slim. What acres of newsprint, she thought, what lakes of ink, had been expended on that topic; and always it came back to the same thing, the sense of difference between people, the erection of barriers of religion, clothing, culture. And yet there were differences and it was naïve to imagine that people were all the same – they weren’t. And everybody needed space, physical space, to live their lives amongst those with whom they shared an outlook and values; which led to the depressing conclusion that the recipe for social justice was keeping people separate from one another, each in his own territory, each in the safety of fellows….The problem was that we could no longer have our own cultural spaces; everybody was now too mixed up for that and we had to share.”

Dalhousie makes the case for geographical space, common cultural values and common future and laments that, in the Middle East and across the planet that neighborhoods, geographical and economic groupings of people largely has collapsed as a natural environment. This makes it more difficult for oneness to flourish because of the clash of values and the competition for space and assets.

There are scant few efforts to create “whole town” cultures. Whole towns would be like the old days when a town had everything it needed including retail, medical, recreational and job opportunities. One notable example of trying to build an integrated town culture is the environment at Microsoft Corporation where there are facilities for babysitting, a fitness center, recreation, opportunity to bring the family for a day or two, a 24-hour restaurant and a work schedule that allows for frequent free time on the Microsoft campus. Microsoft has listened to sociologists who suggest Microsoft will experience more creativity, team effort and commitment to Microsoft if a town atmosphere were maintained.

A developer in Florida has designed neighborhoods with all the facilities a town would need and automobiles must be left at an external parking lot. Everything in the town is within walking or bicycle distance.

How do we recreate a town experience based on common geography, culture and viable economy? Any positive social changes made throughout man’s long history were made by only three processes that are effective.

The first is cause and effect. There is a direct correlation between behavior and a directly related outcome. The Microsoft solution is an example of cause and effect. The Ukrainian conflict also is an example of cause and effect. The second is crisis. Survival of the participants at hand can only survive if everyone survives. The Katrina Hurricane threatened tens of thousands of citizens and required a national response. The third is persuasion. Enough influence is applied to alter behavior.

Unfortunately, many issues cover all three, global warming among them. Allowed to continue with uncontrolled fossil fuel consumption, it is a race to see whether fossil fuels are depleted first or Earth becomes uninhabitable. It is likely that the world will approach a crisis that cannot be reversed and damage will be permanent. If the oceans rise nine feet as predicted, Florida will be a much smaller state. Persuasion will never be more tested as a process than when it disrupts global industries and shifts political power between nations.

Cause and effect can be mitigated by regulations and new profit models. When President Eisenhower authorized the Interstate highway system, trains lost their lock on interstate shipping. Trucking and especially big oil evolved quickly. Can regulations be created to move entrepreneurs to non fossil fuel solutions? Many palms in many governments may need to be greased. Many new international obligations must take place.

Crisis is not a deliberate circumstance. It is an act of nature similar to a plague or disruptive weather; it is a byproduct of war; it is an unintended collapse of an economy; a crisis can be personal as well when health and finances suddenly change. A crisis is so invasive that survival becomes the primary motivation and disrupts existing processes.

Persuasion has many forms: cajoling, payoff, rebellion and voting are examples. Each of these processes requires participation of a substantial population to affect culture. Persuasion can be as small as a sentence or two. As today’s American citizens look back in history, it is hard to believe that women could not vote until 1920 – and only then because of a persuasion that began in 1854!

There is one persuasion not mentioned that is important. It is persuasion by example. In the Christian New Testament, there is a popular story told by Jesus about a Samaritan. Samaritans were Jewish in faith but were considered outcasts by the Hebrew nation because Samaritans had mixed blood with Arabs. Nevertheless, a Samaritan comes across a beaten and robbed Jew. Despite the Samaritan’s awareness that the Jew holds him in disdain, he puts the Jew on his donkey, takes him to an inn and pays his expenses. By example, the Samaritan set a standard for oneness. Each reader easily can find moments where they can set an example that increases oneness.

War and forceful incursion do not lead to oneness; they do not consider the greater reality that affects the lives and cultural stability of the enemy. Similarly, corporations can disrupt stable communities by locating large operations without considering the greater situation of the community. Examples are coal mines, Walmart, and other numerous vertical corporations that eliminate community economies, for example Monsanto and hoof-to-store livestock operations.

Typically, oneness is not a goal in decision making today. Profit seems to be the goal in decision making. Profit is not intrinsically bad unless it forgets to reconcile with the greater reality of community.

The question: Relive a moment when you did something that made you feel you had helped someone in a direct way. Relive a moment when you felt you were at great risk along with other people but together the risk was reduced. Relive a moment when you persuaded someone to change their judgment about something. Did these experiences involve an act of compassion? Was oneness accomplished in each situation?

Ancient Mariner

1The Careful Use of Compliments, Alexander McCall Smith, Pantheon Books 2007, ISBN 978-0-375-42301-7

Oneness II

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ONENESS II

Sympathy, Empathy, Compassion and other forms of Singularity

Once, there was a woman in her sixties who was good at heart but had often been abused. Her circumstances were that she was financially dependent on her psychologically abusive husband. For several reasons, the only way out of her situation was to obtain a divorce; else her life would never be an enjoyable experience.

Several friends of the woman had sympathy for her circumstances and could feel her unhappiness. One day when they had gathered at a local restaurant for lunch, they decided to do what they could to help the distraught woman. Secretly, so neither the woman nor her husband would learn of the plan, the group began raising the money for a divorce. They sought pro bono legal services, arranged a safe place for the woman to stay, and set in motion a divorce process which, at a certain point, would require the participation of the woman.

The woman met with her friends to learn of their plan. At first, the woman resisted because of her pride and the fact that her untenable situation was public knowledge. It was hard to accept a gift from a position that could not repay them for their kindness and support. Finally, after hours of conversation over several meetings, she consented to let the divorce plans move forward.

The friends took charge of everything including staying close to the woman to sustain her will and cooperation regardless of the influence of the husband. A subpoena was served on the husband. The woman left just before the subpoena was served. She moved into the safe house. The plan ended successfully; the woman received a divorce and a small stipend from her husband. The stipend was mailed to the attorney so that the husband did not know where she lived. The woman began a new life supported by her friends and with a new and strong feeling that she was loved – at no cost.

This story contains all the elements of oneness. It includes sympathy (awareness), empathy (emotional understanding), compassion (the act of giving), and oneness – the joy and unity (oneness) of each person who had a role in the event.

This story quickly displays sympathy, empathy and compassion. But what made it work? We need to look under the hood.

Each of the friends individually had a personal life to manage. They chose to look beyond their own situation to consider how another situation could be reconciled. When the friends began the plan, they modified personal situations by collecting money, looking for a lawyer, and all the other detail that was needed to make the plan work. The friends changed their personal priorities to resolve the larger priority of the woman’s situation. To cite a rule for this behavior, an individual (you) is always the given situation. If a situation occurs where there is conflict or imbalance confronting the individual, the individual uses empathy and compassion to reconcile the difference.

A small business owner has twenty employees. Business has slowed and the owner must decide how to adjust costs to keep the business in the black. Obviously, employee costs are the greatest expense and must be reduced. A typical owner will decide – without outside advice – that there will be a layoff of three people. The owner notifies the affected employees and the job is done.

Oneness requires that the owner seek an outside, larger reality, ethic, situation – pick the word you understand best – to help with the decision. The larger reality is the self respect, service, and financial security of the employees. Using the principal of oneness, the smaller reality of the owner seeks to reconcile the issue with the help of the employees, who are the larger reality. Regardless of the outcome, the employees retain self respect, a sense of oneness with the business and the owner has improved the presence of oneness in his company.

The principle is that no one should ever make a decision based solely on internal judgment. Even for the simplest decisions, there must be reconciliation with a larger reality. Some readers may struggle with the word reality. “Situation” or “ethic” work just as well. Whatever word is used, the solution is reconciliation between a smaller situation and a larger situation. It must be noted again that an individual always is the smaller situation.

The key principle is that no one makes a decision without using empathy to consider what larger value may be affected by that decision. The result is one of reconcilement not with personal objectives but one that includes the objectives of a larger situation, a larger awareness. Acting on this larger awareness with compassion is the path to oneness.

The question: Your car fails to start. You need to find a way to work. Who will you talk to? What arrangement will you make? Now think of another solution, and a third, and a fourth. Every solution must involve other people. Your failed car is the smaller reality. In all your solutions, what turns out to be the larger reality?

Ancient Mariner

Jon Stewart’s Biography

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The mariner was at the library the other day. While he was there, he checked out a copy of Jon Stewart’s biography written by Lisa Rogak, Angry Optimist, the Life and Times of Jon Stewart. St. Martin’s Press, 2014.

Jon was and is an eclectic mind driven by a desire to be good at something. He tried everything, including attending William and Mary College in Williamsburg, Virginia, a student body where Jews were a significant minority – likely counted on one hand.

The book is entertaining and a light read. All that aside, what caught the mariner’s attention was that Jon followed the works of Eugene Debs when Jon was young. Eugene Debs! The mariner hasn’t thought of him in decades.

Eugene Debs was a labor union organizer in the earlier years of the twentieth century when the union movement was active. Debs was a union organizer extraordinaire; Readers may recall his organization of the American Railway Union and the Pullman strike of 1894 that shut down train traffic in most of the United States. President Cleveland had to call in the US Army to break the strike.

In today’s capitalist environment, Debs would not have been allowed a platform from which to marshal the nation’s labor force. Times were different as the twentieth century began, however, and Debs was the champion of union organizers.

The American culture was more open and diverse in those days. Debs ran for President five times as a Socialist Party Candidate.

The mariner’s mind was refreshed with an awareness of the upheaval of US culture during the turn of the century. It was a time similar to the time we have now. In Deb’s lifetime, the assembly line was invented, automobiles replaced horses, airplanes made it possible to hop from one city to another in one day, and unions had a new major role in the life of the working class.

The upheaval today is every bit as challenging. Robotics, electronics, computers, and a new global awareness test our understanding of who we are and what we stand for.

The last champion of comparable influence that changed standards against the will of government and business is Ralph Nader, who used public opinion to force the auto industry to significantly upgrade safety standards. It is interesting that changes in cultural ideas and practices cannot occur without a champion who launches the new idea. Without the Debs and Naders of the world, our culture would not take for granted workers’ rights and auto safety – an integral part of our life today.

In 2014, we have many inventors and innovative entrepreneurs. What we need is a champion to harness the culture of the 21st century.

It is true that reading enriches the mind. The mariner has a biography of Jon Stewart to thank for today’s pondering.

Ancient Mariner

Oneness I

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ONENESS

Why write this?

The author is in his middle seventies. The culture of his lifespan is collapsing all about him. The decades have marched by. After the war, the forties and fifties saw the end of the quiet, home town culture – the last days of Norman Rockwell and radio. By the time the author was ten, he no longer had to carry ashes from the basement furnace or empty the pan under the icebox. The telephone had five call letters and seldom rang.

Television had little to brag about early on; he did not realize how fine it became before expansion and capitalism began to whittle television down to the nothingness it is today. Today, the “best” shows are the ones that capture audience share – if only for a season or even one event. The unfathomable power of television to heal, educate, provide factual history and improve the human mind has disappeared. Only PBS holds down the fort – and just barely. Under the hands of entrepreneurs, quality is gone but the profits have soared. The TV cow is milked dry, replaced by a mechanical cow with artificial milk. Today, in 2014, broadcast television itself is under attack as entrepreneurs compete for profitable schemes similar to Netflix, ESPN, HULU, HBO and internet channels.

The sixties and seventies foretold the increasing conflict between government, business and citizenry. The Viet Nam War became an icon for an American society that was beginning to shred American gestalt into pieces divided along generational lines. Still, we were a conglomeration of equal, if conflicted, citizens until the Reagan years. Reagan opened the government to big money, corporatism and unbridled capitalism. It was no longer a government that belonged to the citizenry. The author still weeps at the resultant devastation that has made our government a mockery of democracy and a blatant, troublesome oligarchy. The movie that brought it all together was The Matrix. Individuals were nothing more than batteries in coffins – surviving only to make the powerful even more powerful.

What stopped working? How did greed and prejudice in all it manifestations take control? It was because no one is interested in reconciling the best solution with a larger ideal as a guide. The American society has lost its ethic. We are rootless with no means to set a standard for goodness, ethics, and morality – whatever word touches you as something that isn’t around anymore. Would Andy and his son Opie survive today? Or Pogo or Opus? Or Omnibus? What happened to news programs that were not required to be profit centers? No wonder the only news is sensationalist police chases, wars and murders with a bit of schmaltz thrown in for variety. What a different world it would be if government had not caved to the likes of Rupert Murdock.

One expects cultural change but not the slashing, manipulative and greedy bashing the American citizen has experienced in the last fifty years.

We must learn how to pursue oneness. We must learn how to build a positive gestalt just as a bricklayer lays brick – one at a time; one opportunity at a time; one commitment at a time – to oneness.

The question is this: Technology has obliterated the cultural foundation that began in 1890. What does the new foundation, including its ethical standards, look like? What will be right or wrong? What will be the standard for fairness?

Ancient Mariner