Politics of/and Meaning (21 posts)

8. All?
Thu, Feb 11, 1999 - 11:47 AM/EST
McRostie

I missed a point in Jim's last post, re the word all.

I'll make mine now. All is almost always all bad when used to describe human activity or thought.

Regards. McRostie

9. Exactly!
Thu, Feb 11, 1999 - 11:48 AM/EST
JimP

I don't know which part of that is most offensive to me. Is it the 60 minutes, or the adjective?

I heard someone say that there is no such thing as a bad teacher. If there is learning, the teacher is good. Now there may, admittedly, be those who cause more learning to occur, but learning, like Ivory, is 99 44/100% positive.

Time, likewise, spent with your children is quality. To have their lives so closely arranged that 60 minutes is all the time parents can spend "with" the child, the time is, by definition, quality.

Words and language, to carry a thought from McRostie, are evolutionary. They reflect both culture and mores. Looking at acoustic guitars, human moments, and quality time, what do these terms, as well as others, politically correct for instance have to say about us?

Regards,

Jim

10. I have to disagree in part.
Fri, Feb 12, 1999 - 10:55 AM/EST
Gayle

"I heard someone say that there is no such thing as a bad teacher. If there is learning, the teacher is good. Now there may, admittedly, be those who cause more learning to occur, but learning, like Ivory, is 99 44/100% positive."

It all depends on who the teacher is. Some parents use TV as a baby-sitter. Not everything children learn from television is positive, especially when there is no one around to explain things to the forming mind.

"Time, likewise, spent with your children is quality. To have their lives so closely arranged that 60 minutes is all the time parents can spend "with" the child, the time is, by definition, quality."

The statement is true only if the time spent is loving and nurturing. If a parent is constantly screaming at the child during that spared hour, the "quality" isn't of the highest quality.

"Looking at acoustic guitars, human moments, and quality time, what do these terms, as well as others, politically correct for instance have to say about us?"

I believe it might be saying that we're making excuses.

11. quality time
Fri, Feb 12, 1999 - 2:32 PM/EST
eireann

i meant to post this yesterday, but i ran out of any kind of time, quality or not. anyway, i agree with a lot of what gayle is saying, particularly the part about an hour of screaming is certainly not anyone's defintion of "quality."

when this kind of topic comes up, i usually think about my life as a little kid. my mom hasn't worked outside the home since i (an only child) was born. but she did it because she absolutely
*wanted* to. she's told me a thousand times that as she was growing up, what she wanted to be more than anything else in the world was a mother. she only got one child, but she made the best of it. and that time was truly quality time. likewise, my dad was married once before he met my mother, and had a child right away. he was only 19, and didn't even know what he wanted in life. he joined the navy, and the marriage dissolved as a result. they divorced when his daughter was only 2. he was never a part of her life. in fact, he wasn't even asked to walk her down the aisle when she got married. because of this, my dad made a concerted effort to make the time he *could* spend with me (which wasn't TOO much because he works a lot) true "quality" time. he read to me every night. he always went to parent-teacher nights, even if he had to leave work early. he introduced me to his favorite pastime, watching indiana university basketball, just so i would like to do what he likes to do, and we could do it together.

now, i have a friend whose mother also stayed home throughout her childhood, and her father also worked a lot. however, this mother stayed home not because she wanted to, but because she felt obligated to. she never wanted to leave work, but succumbed to most every woman's natural sense of guilt and to pressure from her husband. as a result, rather than take advantage of the endless hours of "quality" time she had to offer her children, she resented them - seeing them as the reason she wasn't doing what she really wanted to be doing.

i have another friend whose mother kept working after she had her kids, yet she devoted every minute she *wasn't* working towards the commonly accepted notion of "quality" time. her daughter, my best friend, is 22 now, and they have one of the closest mother-daughter relationships i have ever seen, even though the mother just stopped working last year.

so why am i saying all this? i don't think the idea of "quality" time depends on the amount of time, in minutes, it actually is. it depends on what is done with the time one has.

again, sorry for the extra-long post.

-eireann

12.
Fri, Feb 12, 1999 - 3:33 PM/EST
JimP

Once again, I have not clearly stated my thoughts. I was thinking in the realm of communication adjectives. Quality time, human moments, etc. was meant to be the frame for my statement. I didn't state it very well. Sorry.

eireann, so glad to read another post of yours. I've missed you.

I could wear my hair shirt again, and tell you about the time my parents spent with my brother and me, but I'll spare you that.

In a very ephemeral way, my post was meant to be a reflection of the changes I feel affecting my life. I saw a specialization in language, separating, and further defining elements that were once stable. I reckon Toffler put it better in Future Shock. It didn't used to be necessary to say acoustic guitar. A human moment was any moment spent in the presence of another. It still is, but now it defines and separates those moments from other types of relations we have with one another. Quality time was when I looked forward to mom coming home from work, which wasn't every time she came home.

So, I miss the simpler language, and wish that it were not necessary to differentiate between acoustic and electric guitars. But, it is, and I recognize that fact.

Another part of what I was attempting to say is that this differentiation extends to more than language. Some of it is good, sme not so good, some probably even not good at all. We separate, distinguish, label in ways that are only reflected by our language.

So, another musing post. Thanks for listening.

Regards, Jim

13. JimP
Fri, Feb 12, 1999 - 6:07 PM/EST
Gayle

"I saw a specialization in language, separating, and further defining elements that were once stable."

PC aside, some things need to have qualifying words attached because of advancements in technology. I'm not a musician, but I do know a guitar really isn't just a guitar...for example, there is the Spanish guitar. I believe it is called that not only because of the way it's played but because of its construction. The same goes for acoustic and electric.

Then there are the qualifiers we've been discussing (human & quality)...those seem just plain sad to me. A sign of our hurried times. They appear to be excuses we make before we get our priorities straight...if we ever do.

"We separate, distinguish, label in ways that are only reflected by our language."

I think labels are often attached to things or people we can't comprehend for whatever reason. It's a way of putting things in their place, and making them safe or more understandable to ourselves.

The changable language is beautiful. It's alive. English (to me) is the best of all because it borrows and absorbs from all the others, allowing us to describe so many things to the enth degree. I love the mental images this language is capable of creating, like no other can. It's a good thing! (Sorry, Martha.) ?:)

14. Safe, or separate?
Sun, Feb 14, 1999 - 7:26 PM/EST
JimP

Labels may be useful, even necessary, in allowing us to put ideas about others into some place that we can think rationally of them. Labels are less useful when used as separators. There is, in my opinion, a very fine line, almost non-existent, between the two.

I don't want to think rationally about blacks or southerners, or yankees. I want to think rationally about individuals who I know that happen to be black. I want to think rationally about my friends and associates here in NC who are southerners. I want to think rationally about my friends and associates who are yankees. I could put specific names to each of these, but it isn't important here that I do so. These are examples only, and there are so many more of them.

I don't want to be told that all, or even most, of any identifier do thus - I know that is almost always not true.

I have a definite impression that I am getting into areas that we don't, or perhaps even shouldn't, discuss in a forum such as this. But, we should! It is the subtle, underlying assumptions that our communications show most clearly when discussed in the open, that cause us to examine them, and possibly even adapt them to a newer reality.

Regards,

Jim

15. just a question...
Mon, Feb 15, 1999 - 1:54 PM/EST
eireann

excuse my ignorance, but what's a "hair shirt?" it's come up too many times now for me to continue ignoring it. :)

-eireann

16.
Mon, Feb 15, 1999 - 2:07 PM/EST
JimP

A hair shirt is "a coarse haircloth garment worn next to the skin by religious ascetics as penance." American Heritage College Dictionary, Third edition, p 611.

You can imagine the itching effect of having one next to your skin.

Worn outside, it serves only to show others how devout you are, or purport to be.

17. Labeling?
Tue, Feb 16, 1999 - 10:39 AM/EST
McRostie

There are times Jim, when the use of a label to identify groups of people or things is quite useful. We have a standard in law that helps in making that determination. If the courts find the label, or grouping or classification to be "arbitrary and/or capricious", it will be struck down. On the other hand, if the label etc. is found to have a reasonable justification, it will generally be upheld.

There are times in dealing with social problems when it is useful to know whether one falls within the class of alien, or landed immigrant for instance, just as it is useful to know when one is within the class deemed in poverty.

I know that this idea of classification is a favorite target of some conservatives, and particularly of Libertarians, but I believe it can be adequately defended when used properly.

Regards, McRostie

18. Labels
Tue, Feb 16, 1999 - 5:02 PM/EST
JimP

Labels are, at times, useful. It is the methodology used to identify, as you state so well McRostie. Most of the time I think of the legitimate uses as statistical classifications, as I believe you recognize in your post.

My own, personal, aversion to labels comes when an individual, read me, places all persons possessing some quality, or falling within some classification, into a word box. As in, "All those _______ (fill in the blank) are _____."

That's a label, and I catch myself doing that all too often. My wife continually reminds me that all the bad drivers in the world seem to get in front of me. The hopeful sign is that I do catch myself. Years ago, I did not.

I appreciate the change in me. I wrote a short poem about it some time ago. For the heck of it, I'll enclose it here. I'm trying to say that I appreciate the changes in my life that have moved me from the edge.

THE EDGE

For most, the challenge is to survive
Pain's daily notice that they are alive.
There are more who stand on
Crumbling ledges of disaster's precipices,
More who collapse exhausted beneath life
Than from a brisk bike ride, or jog in the park.

Survival's cold passion gives purpose clarity,
Once it's assured, each chance is seized,
To rekindle flames smoldering beneath ease.
We drive hard, not for the time, but excitement,
Approach our limits, use drugs to reach beyond,
When it is over, cry "Is that all there is?"

Though pain and tears remain, today's cliffs
Are scenery, and thus less sheer.

Jim P
November, 1998



Think about it. Would we, relatively wealthy individuals, even be discussing the subjects we have if we were still collapsing each day from hard physical labor in the factories and fields?

We have much to be thankful for, and much to use to enable others to move away from the precipices of disaster.

Regards,

Jim

19. Been there, done that
Wed, Feb 17, 1999 - 10:56 AM/EST
McRostie

Been poor as a youngster, and "relatively wealthy" as an adult. Like wealthy better. You're right Jim, it does give us the luxury of "discussion" where when poor we have the requirement for survival.

To touch on labels again for a minute, your emphasis in the example you give is misplaced. The problems are not with the blanks in the sentence, but rather with the world "all" at its start, as you have so often made clear.

Regards, McRostie

20. And, once more I need to clarify
Wed, Feb 17, 1999 - 12:03 PM/EST
JimP

I hadn't meant the emphasis to be the blanks. I, too, deplore assigning traits and attributes by virtue of a label.

The adjective "all" is often implied, as in "Women are ____." It is when an identifiable group of individuals are assigned the attribute symbolized by the blank to a group as a label that I am most concerned. We all do it. I do, certainly.

I hope this clarifies my point about labels.

Regards, Jim

21. Identifiers?
Wed, Feb 17, 1999 - 6:53 PM/EST
McRostie

The clarification wasn't needed Jim. All that is required is to use the word "some" before the word women. Then the statement, in most cases could withstand challenge.

Regards McRostie