Humility

One of the seven capital virtues is humility — playing opposite to the sin of pride. But as the song goes: Lord, it’s hard to be humble when you are perfect in every way. Or as Hercule Poirot puts it: One of my finest qualities is my humbility!

Asking people to be humble in the age of self-esteem is a bit contradictory. Humility requires a certain self-effacement, a level of thinking yourself unworthy compared to others. Taken too far it displays as low self-esteem or even victimhood. If you think of yourself as lesser, it is possible that people will begin to treat you as lesser — which of course re-enforces your low opinion of yourself.

As usual, anything taken too far is damaging to the self and ultimately damaging to society. Both humility and pride are flip sides of the same ugly idea, that is, the idea that inequality is a natural thing. Although the American constitution may hold certain truths to be self evident, that all men are created equal, it is abundantly clear that they were just joking. Even at the time, they certainly didn’t mean all men and women weren’t even in the picture. Not surprisingly, inequality has been at the centre of American society ever since.

To be fair few societies have done much better — though some have tried harder.

Perhaps there is a certain truth to the idea — as primates, we are trapped to some extent by status. We recognize alpha males and those who must defer to them. But building an entire social order on the fact that some guys are bigger than others —- and more aggressive — is kind of dumb. And in any case, our big brains have been devising ways to level the playing field ever since the first caveman picked up a club. Big muscles are pretty irrelevant in the face of a sub-machine gun.

Clearly technology has allowed us to level the playing field physically so why have we clung to the trappings of status (as a side note, Fortune 500 CEOs are taller than the general population — and I’m pretty sure it’s not so they can see farther) granting people privileges they certainly haven’t earned?

Equality may not come naturally but, let’s face it we haven’t been living in a state of nature since the invention of agriculture. Maybe it’s time for our great big brains to figure out ways to stop worrying about esteem and start focusing on equality.

Now that would be something to be proud of — in a modest kind of way.

And that’s ten minutes.

Horny

There is a huge market around the world for things that will increase — what’s the word? – potency. Male potency. Okay, let’s call it what it is — things that help otherwise limp fellows get hard.

We’ve all seen the ads — people dancing for joy while sprinklers flood lawns. TVs abandoned to empty living rooms while the action movies play out off stage.

Who am I to question such desires? After all I’m sure it has restored happiness to many sexual relations. It has apparently also lead to an increase in both divorce rates among the elderly and new health issues — STDs — in senior’s residences. But they are consenting adults — even if not really smart ones — and if they want to experiment with some enhancing prescriptions, let them, as they say, go at it.

Unfortunately, not everyone likes the idea of helping big pharma ‘inflate’ their profits. Some object to the idea of artificial stimulants of any kind. Others argue that there are more natural ways to boost that all important organ.

Ginseng is often promoted as natural alternative to Viagra. There have even been some studies that show that much of the Ginseng sold in health food stores do the job just fine. The same studies reveal that the samples taken off the shelves are laced with — you guessed it — Viagra.

A more insidious remedy is rhino horn. In certain traditional or alternative “medical” practices, it is considered the most effective way of increasing male sexual desire (and cure cancer and hangovers, too). It’s a form of sympathetic magic. The rhino is big and aggressive. Its horn is firm and upstanding. You get the picture.

It doesn’t work, of course, but that doesn’t slow down the demand. As a result, rhinos are slaughtered by poachers at an alarming rate. Rhinos may soon be extinct as a result. Then what will those limp-dicked bastards do?

The saddest thing about all this is that the rhino horn is nothing but keratin — the same substance found in hair and finger nails. That’s right; maybe you could grind up your neighbour’s dreadlocks and put it instead of a little rhino horn in your oatmeal. And as such, it grows back. It should be possible to simply tranq the rhino and harvest the horn.

A renewable erectile resource. But that would be logical. And people who think that eating the hairy extrusion of an herbivore’s face will make them horny are probably not high on the logic chart.

But that’s ten minutes.

Real Writers

I was so happy today to discover that I’m not really a writer. Despite having sold four novels (and written five others) and more than twenty five short stories, I am not a ‘real writer.’ Never mind the half dozen plays I’ve had produced — I definitely do not fall into the category of ‘true author.’

For one thing I don’t let real life get in my way. I like real life. I enjoy my day job. I like hanging around with friends. I look forward to grocery shopping and even a clean house. I often find real inspiration for stories in the mundane tasks and ordinary people I meet.

However, I don’t really worry about inspiration. Most of my stories don’t come from those ‘out of the blue ideas’ or thoughts at all hours of the day and night. Generally my stories are generated through a fairly organized process of brainstorming. I create inspiration by actively playing with ideas.

And it invariably happens during daylight hours. I have lost sleep over problems at work or worries about money or the health of those I love. But lie awake all night thinking about writing? Can’t say I can remember it ever happening.

I have been known to stare into space and get lost in thought — but it is as often caused by thinking about politics as story — which occasionally interferes with my people watching activities. In fact, I can’t tell you how often my wife has said to me — did you see that guy juggling knives and I’ve replied: no, when was that? Still, I have been known to find pleasure sitting in a cafe or bar and watching the people walk by — anything as an excuse not to write.

Concentration? I can barely focus long enough to get down a few hundred words. Why do you think I spend my time writing these ten-minute blurbs?

Oh, it is true I have in the past been known to sit and write for hours — I did once win the 3-day novel writing contest, which required me to produce 33K words in three short days — but even that weekend I took one night off to eat dinner and drink my face off with friends. Nowadays, the smallest little thing — a stiff neck, the need to pee, a desire for chocolate — can haul me out of my chair and away from my work-in-progress.

And self-doubt, crippling or otherwise, is not in my nature. Ask anyone who has suffered under the glare of my self-esteem.

So, whew, I’m not a real writer. Though I do write from time to time. But that’s okay. I still manage to put a couple hundred thousand words a year into various projects. And still have a real life.

And that’s ten minutes.

Cuban Diary

Spending a week at a resort in Cuba can easily distort your view of what the country is like. People are being entrepreneurial and there is plenty on sale – tours and trinkets and, of course, rum and cigars. But make no mistake; this is still the land of Fidel and Che.

It is obvious once you leave the artificial and carefully isolated worlds of the resorts. The images of the revolution are everywhere, posters with Ernesto ‘Che’ Guevara’s face and slogans, monuments to victories of the revolution. Travel down to Santa Clara and you are welcomed to the city of Che Guevara.

Is it a façade? Some Americans say so – they insist that the Cuban people yearn to be free of the yoke of socialist servitude. Of course, these are the same prognosticators who insisted the Iraqi people would welcome them as liberators and the wars of the Middle East would be ‘self-financing.’ Didn’t quite work out that way, did it? I sometimes wonder where those guys are now – Cheney and Wolfowitz and the rest. Back cowering in their bunkers I suppose.

Many Cubans are deeply proud of what they have wrought in the face of opposition from the most powerful nation in the world. They readily acknowledge that some of it was done with the support of the Soviet Union – but if anything they are even more proud of what they did after the Soviet system collapsed and they were left truly on their own. Many Cubans resent the interference of the USA – interference that has gone on since the days of the Spanish American war. They do not hesitate to inform you that the existence of the naval base in Guantanamo Bay (and you know, they say, what is done there) is illegal not only under international law but under American law.

Winning over Cuba to the American way will be a challenge.

One of the most moving sights I saw in Cuba – saw anywhere in some time – was the memorial to Che Guevara in Santa Clara. The external part was all monumental – a 20-ton bronze statue of Che in guerrilla outfit and rifle, gazing resolutely to the future. The friezes were equally monumental. But the interior of the memorial – where no photos are allowed and no mementoes provided is a fundamental reflection of the legacy of Che to ordinary Cubans.

It is a chamber like a mountain cave – there is a small pool and fountain with plants lit by a tiny skylight. Along one wall are life-sized cameos of heroes of the revolution – those who died in battle or like Che in the effort to spread the cause farther afield. Che is there but his face is no larger and has little more prominence than all the others. These are simple human expressions, some grim, some laughing, all intense and determined. Men and two women who died doing what they believed to be right and necessary.

This was the true memorial – human faces sacrificed to build a humane society. It’s hardly perfect. There is a lot of poverty but little inequality. Health care and education are free and access to the best universities is provided based on merit rather than money. Everybody works at something and no-one goes without the basics of life.

I wonder if it can survive the coming onslaught of American money and attitudes. I hope so.

And that’s ten minutes (Cuban time)

Heavy Metal

It is commonly thought that Vincent van Gogh was a bit crazy. After all, he is reputed to have cut off his ear as a sign of affection for his girlfriend (or because she dumped him). That is, at the very least, eccentric though at least he didn’t go the Origen route.

Then of course there are those freaky paintings where the colours seem strange and everything is surrounded by a halo. Clearly, this signifies a form of madness.

Or perhaps it is a symptom of heavy metal poisoning. Most of the paints in Vinnie’s time had pretty strange compositions. Cadmium Red for example had Cadmium in it. In small doses Cadmium — say from putting your paint brush near your mouth — can have some odd effects, including visual distortions. Halos, for example. In larger doses, heavy metals can lead to psychotic behavior, disability and death.

There is one theory that lead poisoning is culpable for a number of negative outcomes. One of the symptoms of lead poisoning is diminished intellect. Others include an increase in impulsive and violent behavior. It is possible that lead in gasoline was much to blame for rising rates of civilian violence after the Second World War and that its removal has been a factor in the gradual fall in violent crime since the seventies. As one researcher has pointed out, only a few countries still allow lead in gasoline — including Somalia and North Korea. These are not the first places you think of when you imagine calm rational non-violent behavior.

A chemist friend of mine has been taking this idea a bit further. He believes that the best thing we can do for human health, prosperity and progress is to remove all metals from common use. He’s working on organic alternatives to building materials (carbon nano-tubules for example) or for batteries. He strongly believes that non-metallic organic chemistry will be critical to solve many of our environmental and health problems in the future.

Maybe this is what people are really talking about when they say they feel refreshed and stronger for spending time in remote wilderness areas. It is not spiritual but a release from constantly being poisoned by metals.

Of course, the problem is, pollution travels everywhere and metal pollution persists in the environment. Mercury, which has horrible effects on metabolisms, is found throughout the arctic, produced by burning coal and can carried by winds all the way from China. Oddly the effects of mercury poisoning are similar to those of fetal alcohol syndrome — another problem found throughout the North. It would be ironic and very sad if we solved the latter problem through education and cultural change only to see children fall victim to the former because we have been too reluctant — for no better reason than money — to solve the larger problem of environmental degradation.

But that’s ten minutes.

Haggling (Cuban Diary)

I have a theory about haggling in developing world markets. It’s quite simple. Don’t do it.

Whatever price you are initially offered is almost always lower than half the price you would expect to pay at home. You are already getting a bargain. If the price is still too high – you obviously don’t want or need the thing anyway. To drive the price lower just because you can is morally wrong. To engage in haggling and then not buy the thing is doubly worse. You are merely playing a game with people’s livelihoods.

I’ve heard people argue that it is part of their culture. They expect you to bargain. They inflate the price because you are a tourist and not haggling distorts the economy.

Bullshit. Your money may aid the economy but it in no way distorts it.

And you are not participating in their culture; you are exploiting it. Here’s why.

When people who belong to the same community haggle, it is a form of social interaction designed to reaffirm relationships. The key thing is that each side of the negotiation knows the proper price range of the thing for sale. It’s a range because of variations in market availability. Some days these are the only – or the best — mangos around. Some days, mangos are plentiful. Both parties know this and can come to an agreeable price.

As a tourist, you have no idea of the true value of things. You have no idea if the asking price is fair or outrageous. When there are multiple sellers of a product they will self-regulate the market. Charging you more than they might ask a local for sure, but not so much that there is an incentive for the guy in the next stall to give you a lower offer.

So already the first rule of free markets has been broken – the seller has information you don’t possess.

But there is something more important at play. Power. You, as the visitor, have all the power in the negotiation. You – for the most part – are indifferent whether you buy today or buy this particular shawl as opposed to that particular shirt. You can walk away with nothing lost. The seller on the other hand had to haul his goods – often on his back – to the market, possibly a journey of several hours. And if he doesn’t sell the object, he has to haul it home again. If it is perishable it is a dead loss.

So the seller can be driven to the point where she is actually losing money on the deal, certainly to the point where she is getting nothing for her labour. Because they have to sell and you don’t have to buy, you can literally damage the economy just so you save 50 cents.

So you can haggle all you want. Maybe you’ll come home and brag about the deals you got. But I want you to know one thing. Some of us will think you’re a prick.

And that’s ten minutes (Cuban time).

Tipping (Cuban Diary)

There is an inequity to tipping. It is based on how much your clients spend and not on how hard you work. It is also patronizing in the old sense of the word. The patron – or lord of the manor – bestows his or her largess on the lower classes, the serving classes, either based on some standard that his class establishes or on a whim.

It doesn’t stop there either. Better looking waiters and waitresses get bigger tips than those who are more plain of face or standard of body. And sexism? Men get better tips than women for the same level of service.

But this is not the inequity I was talking about.

In many establishments, managers who are already well paid insist on significant kickbacks from the tips of servers – who are generally poorly paid and need their tips to pay their rent and support their children. In other places, front-line staff receive the bulk of the tips while those who work behind the scenes – cooking or clearing tables or washing the dishes receive little or nothing.

The system is based on good will but generally only creates bad. I know, I’ve spent a few years waiting tables and tending bar back in my “full-time” (ha-ha) writing and acting career.

But there are further inequities built into the system. First and foremost are the laws that in many jurisdictions allow employers to pay less than the standard minimum wage in food service industries. The idea is that waiters will more than make up the difference in tips. However, the sub-standard wage applies even in fast food restaurants where tipping is neither expected nor allowed. What is the logic behind that? Rich people like to be waited on by poor people?

But wait there’s more. Tips are taxable and tax collectors go to great lengths to figure out how much a waiter may have made so they can tax them accordingly. I’ve heard that lifestyle audits now used to catch drug dealers and others with illicit income were invented to catch waiters from high end restaurants who didn’t claim enough of their tips.

But the thing is – that money was already taxed by the person paying the tip. If you employed a servant in your house, their pay would be – if you worked it right – tax deductible. Certainly, if as a publisher, I pay someone to do book design, this is a business expense and is deducted  from my business income. Yet, with tipping first I pay the income tax and then the waiter pays it again.

There is a simple solution – one you see applied in places like Italy or Australia. Figure out a way to pay serving staff a living wage – through statutory means or by making it easy to unionize. Then all that awkward tableside arithmetic can be avoided.

But that’s ten minutes (Cuban time).

Elite Status

I fly quite a bit and most of my flights are long ones so each year I qualify for Aeroplan Elite status — usually with the last flight of the year. So I am ‘Elite’ but just barely. This gives me a chance to observe people who travel a lot more than me and who generally have a lot more money than me.

One thing I’ve observed is that people with Super Elite status — mostly corporate executives and high-flying politicians or rich retirees — are pretty much helpless rude losers. They may — I wait to be convinced — be super achievers in their business or private life but, when they get to the airport, they are pathetic.

They are the first to find the priority line — which I generally only use when I have a lot of luggage — but once they arrive at the service desk, you would think they had never been at an airport before. They root around in their bags looking for their passport or their flight itinerary and look dumbfounded when asked a question. But their own questions are seemingly endless and most of them, I’m pretty sure, have nothing to do with getting their boarding pass. And watching them go through security is just pathetic (I’m pretty sure the Nexus pass was designed to save airport staff time rather than the passengers.)

What is with that? I expect that they are too important to actually manage their own affairs. Their staff make their appointments for them and then make sure they get there on time. If they screw up, someone else will surely fix the problem. They don’t do their own taxes but instead pay large sums to accountants to help them avoid them. False economies mean nothing to people who are flush with cash.

So I wasn’t surprised to find out that rich people are ruder than the rest of us. It fits pretty well with my own observations. I generally get to upgrade my seat to business class two or three times a year — a nice reward when my flight is scheduled to arrive home at 1am — and so I get to see these people in action. They are often surly and demanding with the flight staff. On occasion, there are people who need to get off the plane to make a tight connection. Despite pleas from the attendants to stay seated to let those people pass, at least one guy in business class will leap to his feet and then take his own sweet time to get his gear together. You can see the contempt and rage on their faces when the poor sod from the back of the bus asks them to move aside.

And, of course, you can’t help but hear their conversations with each other — it’s all about money and privilege and right wing politics.

The next time one of them says to me — as a few have — that they think having to pay higher taxes is class warfare, I’ll be tempted to explain: Taxes are what you pay to avoid class warfare; class warfare is when they push your sorry ass against the wall and shoot you.

But that’s ten cantankerous minutes.

Snorkeling (Cuban Diary)

I’ve been snorkeling a few times but this week was the first time I’ve ever done it off a boat. The experience was a good lesson in the triumph of reason over instinct.

My previous times in the water were gentle – I began on a beach in Cozumel where there were plenty of fish but the water never exceeded a meter in depth. Nice gentle surf and no worries about undertows (or sharks). Later I swam off a beachside cliff – a coral wall where the water was more than ten meters deep but again I could stay close to the wall and safety. A few years later I snorkeled along a point of land in Puerto Escondido. The surf was a bit strong but the water wasn’t deep. In every case I had a strong swimmer right beside me the whole time.

This time was different. We put on our gear and then went down a ladder into three meters of water. As soon as I was in – essentially by myself, the person before already swimming away, the person above waiting for me to get out of the way— I regretted it. Having nearly drowned twice before, I was anxious. The fact I had since taken swimming lessons hardly seemed to matter. I suddenly knew I couldn’t do it. I even mumbled that past my mouthpiece.

This is instinct at play. Our primitive emotions demand that we fight, flee or freeze. Hardly helpful when you’re clinging to a boat in ten feet of water. The boat woke me up by banging into my ribs – I have a nice bruise to show for it. The shock awakened my reasoning mind. I literally said to myself – this is easy and you know how it works. You have a floatation device around your waist and fins on your feet. You have a breathing tube in your mouth. Lie flat and breathe.

So I did. I kicked a little and did a little breast stroke and moved away from the boat towards a reef. Fish – black and yellow or iridescent purple surrounded me. Large silver ones swam lazily by in tandem. A few small barracuda lurked still as sticks of wood. Coral fronds and fans waved. Sometimes I could sense the other swimmers near me; other times I felt completely alone.

The panic didn’t fully go away. A suck of salt through the snorkel brought it back; a sudden feeling of exhaustion in my arms almost sent me scurrying back to the boat. But each time my mind took over. Just float, it said. Kick with the fins; don’t use your arms. Rest and look and take pleasure in what you see.

That’s how reason works when instinct and emotion fail. We get into jams all the time as individuals and as societies. Sometimes instinct and emotion help – they at least point us toward danger. But they seldom lead us away. That requires language and reason and thought. It requires calmness and time. It is not the first tool in our toolbox but reason is always the most powerful and adaptable one. It will keep you from drowning and, ultimately, it will keep us all from disaster.

And that’s ten minutes (Cuban time).

Mars

The private sector Mars mission just announced the 100 finalists for their planned colony on Mars. Eventually this group will be whittled down to twenty four and, if the project’s backers can raise enough money (a very big IF), they will launch these people, four at a time, on a one-way trip to Mars.

That’s right — one-way. Everyone who goes on this trip is going to die on Mars — or in one of multitude of ways that could happen en route. So the question becomes not if they will die on Mars but when.

Most experts think their lives will be measured in weeks or months rather than years. Well, frankly, most experts don’t think they will go there at all.

The argument over who does a better job at space travel — the public or the private sector — rages in circles where those arguments rage (mostly science fiction conventions and on-line forums of space enthusiasts) but so far it has been mostly theoretical.

Those who are keen on private enterprise point out the obvious inefficiencies of NASA and other government space agencies, as well as their inherent cautiousness. Despite that cautiousness — an obvious reluctance to waste valuable human resources not to mention the bad PR it would cause — government efforts have managed to kill a fair number of people.

But those were accidents and not a condition of employment. Only the private sector can be so cavalier about human lives.

In any case, it remains moot. So far the private space industry has not accomplished much and certainly hasn’t accomplished anything — so far — that hasn’t already been done by government bodies.

To the extent they have gotten a few things off the ground, their only claim to fame is that they did it cheaper. Whether they are as effective is difficult to say — there simply isn’t a large enough sample to show whether private rockets succeed (or fail spectacularly) at a greater rate than public ones.

All that aside, the question in most people’s minds is: why do it at all? Young people in particular are more likely to be reluctant to send humans into space (and I thought we got risk-averse as we got older) arguing that we can do it with robots.

This may be because they have been raised on science fiction where robots are portrayed as actually smart and capable and not the hopeless dummies they mostly are. Computers are faster than humans at a number of computational and data sorting functions (that’s why they can do so well at chess and Jeopardy) but can’t do a lot of the things humans do so well — like recognize danger or improvise solutions on the fly. Or even walk and recognize faces.

Someday they may be capable of what humans can do but for now any really interesting stuff done in space will be done by people. But still, why do it at all? To advance human knowledge? To provide us with an alternative habitat in case (or when) we mess this one up?

Or maybe as George Mallory put it: because it’s there.

And that’s ten minutes.