A common good: The gift of sharing.

I've been writing about patience & waiting in the days before December. I've also been listening to our national debate over health care. The debate is coming to an end w/the Senate floor action. During this discussion many ideas flop around, assertions made, facts determined, and opinions expressed.

The Headline: Sunday, November 29, 2009,
New York Times:

Food Stamp Use Soars Across US, Stigma Fades

The Maps:

1) Growth of Food Stamp use from June 2007- June 2009.

Front page map shows high growth in food stamp in FL, home of the head "Ditto-Head" and in ID, WY, UT, NV, & GA. (These six states have ten GOP Senators.)

2) Percentage people in each county who receive food stamps, June 2009.

Jump page map show use highest across the south from AZ thru NM, TX, OK, MO, AR, LA, MS, AL, KY, TN, NC, GA, SC WV, & FL. (These 16 states have twenty-two GOP Senators.)

I feel really good about sharing the wealth of our nation with anyone who needs. Using the Department of Agriculture Food Stamp Program should be stigma free and available to any citizen who is hungry. Even if they are Republican. I ask are these the same places where people are organizing against a right to affordable health care insurance under the label of the Tea Party Patriots? I didn't do a scientific study but looking at the lists of links by state at the Tea Party Patriots Web site and at the Wikipedia page it seems like a large number of these states are the same places. Citizens in good conscience rail against "socialist health care" yet while use the roads, libraries, fire departments, public gathering places and our shared wealth in the form of food stamps. Where are Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck and the like most popular? I looked around and it looks like they are popular all over. I guess the masters of misinformation drive the discussion on this point and they'll certainly ignore this story.

In many cases these are the same people who think nothing spending millions of dollars for three days of intensive care for a malformed premature infant whose prognosis at birth, or even before birth, is for three to six months of life. Life, they say, is sacred. Often the same folks who would force a pregnant woman to seek illegal care to control the outcome of her pregnancy, on the notion that God endows life and life begins when sperm meets egg & genes are intertwined. A poor definition of life in my book. Life is a line, not series of dots, lined up. People exist along the line we don't start & end, we participate. Each moment of consciousness is a decision to continue participating. Life began 3.X billion years ago on Earth and now it is in every crevice and nook.

We can disagree about policies and programs a government should promote. We can disagree about what unseen, or unknown things to believe in. We can teach our children what we choose even if it is a lie like the Easter Bunny exists or Santa comes down the chimney on Christmas morning to celebrate the birth on earth of God made man. But we need each other. We need all of humanity to continue our life on this planet. We even need people who believe such wild stories as are being told in the ultra-conservative, "taxes are only for poor" mainstream media like Fox. We need to share our world if we are to live on it long enough for our species to survive. Self-awareness should allow us to plan the next step in human culture but only if we can move as one.

Health is key to life so it should be a basic right. We need our neighbors to be healthy or we will get infected by them. Our children deserve to be taught how to be healthy. Our government is a great place to mediate & govern the vast and complex issues that make up the public, individual health care universe. A doctor is only a small part of the healthcare system. Patients have responsibility to monitor their own health, instead we've become a nation of fools paying more for less and believing we're getting the best. It's as if we have are the Emperor in the story of the Emperor Has No Clothes. I mourn for our democracy if the loud voices who led us with the failed policies of the past 3 decades can win this debate just by lying to their fans.

One final note on the health care debate: Our nation deserves to have healthy citizens, we need healthy citizens so we can once again lead the world in: innovation; creativity; social, cultural, economic, & artistic ideas; sports; technology; and medicine. We can afford to have the best if we stand up and demand reason prevail over faith, lies, and superstition. We can not afford to continue the byzantine system of healthcare delivery we have now, it bankrupts individuals, small & large businesses across the country. We need the Senate and the House to finish their work and deliver a bill to President Obama for signature.

Time: A gift of preparation

Turning from November to December. (From nine to ten – those Romans really did influence our calendar didn't they?) I'm ready for the season of reason. I'll prepare for the mid-winter holiday I love so much. It hasn't really snowed here yet, at least no accumulation. Not cold enough to make ice for skating. The lakes, still, open water. We haven't had more than a few days of temps below freezing.

So let's keep the mid-winter holiday in perspective. This not a time for a feeding frenzy of purchasing like the stories in the paper. Not a time to obsess about every detail of a party still weeks away. It is time to share with friends and acquaintances. Share food, meals are excellent sharing venues.

• Invite a friend to breakfast or dinner today.

Clothing: A gift of modesty & deceit.

When did humans begin to wear clothing? Estimates seem to differ widely but, I think we can safely say it was between the dawn of the neolithic age, 11, 000-15,000 years ago and human control of fire as far back as 650,000 years. I wrote about Skin and Eccrine sweat glands: A new sensitivity & mobility. in May. Clothing is a unique human creation that provides a second skin and a cultural pallet.

Beyond protection from the elements and establishing gender differentiation, marking status, and style, clothes have become a form of communication. Clothes are a canvas for self expression and a tool to conceal or reveal the form of our flesh. We use clothes to shield our neighbors from having to look at our sex organs, to make statements about politics or economics and obscure the real shape of our bodies. We accentuate what we perceive to be our best features with clothing. We use color to express our feelings and, while these uses of this ancient tool are in the forefront today, clothes' functions: warmth; protection from insects, disease, weapons, or hazards of the surrounds, are still paramount to a garment's usefulness.

I want my clothes to fit, be stylish -after a certain fashion that may not fit within the strictures of contemporary design - and to protect me from a myriad of potential ills. When I put on the red suit, whether a full Santa costume or just a vibrant tee, I put on a form of modesty and I start to live a lie. I'm a portrayer of Santa. I am not Santa. I live as Santa 24/7 but when the reindeer go to sleep and I curl up with the paper the sad fact is I cannot fly anymore than they can. But, I can give gifts. I can tell stories of our past and point out how far we've come since our naked ancestors started using tools to increase our ability to survive into the next generation.

Now, we've come so far that our biology would perish if our tools had to all be abandoned. Most people would die without tools. If you're a regular reader of The Wisdom of Santa, you know that I chronicle gifts from our ancestors that are often tools. Physical tools are becoming less important than social tools. Look at facebook or twitter. These tools, like clothes, allow a double use. One is to polish or protect us, make look shiny, happy, or goth - ready for work, play, or relaxation. The other is to obscure us. To hide our zits, our scars, our flab or skinny exposed ribs. Clothing can make the small look large and the large small.

When protect our body from the cold or our friend from having to look at our sorry flesh, we use clothes for modesty and deceit. Our style of clothing follows our ability to control the materials we use fashion our clothes. I marvel at how far we've come just in my lifetime in fabrics to keep us warm. From amazingly scratchy, heavy wool to the softness of PolarFleece or the claustrophobic rubberized rain gear to today's Gortex. The culture uses of clothing are as important as its functions.

Justice: A gift of divided governance.

Sonia Sotomayor will become the 111 Justice of the United States Supreme Court today. Chief Justice John Roberts will swear her in during a private ceremony at the Supreme Court.

I wrote about the importance of empathy in May (Empathy: The first gift of human civilization) when President Barrack Obama nominated Sotomayor. And in April I discussed the value of government (Government: A gift from the founders to US.) When the United States Senate confirmed Sotomayor on Thursday, the president said we had taken another step toward a more perfect union. As the the third woman and third non-white member of the Court Sotomayor will give us justice just like each of the previous Justices.

In my country there are people who would deny citizens justice. 31 US Senators voted "no" on justice when the President's nominee was presented to them. In essence they were saying she can't be fair or impartial because she is a woman and a latina. Many of these Senators stood to speak their mind on this topic. They sound to me as anti-government, anti-justice and anti-democracy as any member of the anarchist groups I've been involved with in the past. When the Republicans in office sound like anarchists attacking government with a vehemence once reserved only for the truly disturbed you must wonder if our system can ever work. Can we ever have a civil discussion of ideas?

These supposed freedom loving folk have now turned their attention to lying and bullying their way thru August helping insurance companies stay in control of the ever increasing costs and ever diminishing quality of outcomes in our health care system. If they are successful, our health care system will continue to limp along with the highest cost buying us the 37th, 54th, or 72nd best results. We can't let this happen. We have to do a few things:

1) Support government. Government is good. Our government provides many important functions one of which should be to lead on health care. Along with freedom of speech, public common spaces and thoroughfares, rights to bear arms and train for common defence, the right to be healthy is, and should be guaranteed.

2) Support a new approach to the healthcare system. We have to change the way we're doing it because paying so much for so little is stupid. It will bankrupt us.

3) Speak out, not just to your elected reps but to your friends and neighbors, especially if they disagree with your position. Talk with respect and dignity to your adversaries.

If we do these things across the country we can change the health care system for the better.

Bullying: The gift of broken discourse.

Well, I've just watched about a dozen public meetings where Members of Congress, Senators and other elected officials have been shouted down by bullies. These folks, apparently schooled by Dick Armey's lobby firm Freedom Works rise to ask questions or just start shouting in the middle of the event with misinformation and smears. They impugn government, the same government that they have worked so hard to destroy for the past 28 years. They shout, bluster and offer no ideas just an all out assault on public discourse. They seem to want to destroy anything that is left of the commons. Oh the humanity!

It's gone from bad - having these lying, greedy, bullies in office - to worse - having these lying, greedy, bullies trying to destroy from without what they couldn't destroy when they held power.

I'm sick to my stomach watching the evidence.

A ranking Senator on the Judiciary Committee has said he will not support Judge Sonia Sotomayor because he's afraid that she could not be objective and fair in the conduct of her job. This despite 17 years of written evidence to the contrary. I call on Jeff Sessions to use this same standard in his deliberations and in the performance of his job. Objectivity! Yes, government by science! Please, Jeff, say you will!

I want my country! I want people who support and defend the Constitution when it calls for a more perfect union, justice, domestic tranquility, common defence, general welfare and the blessing of liberty. I'm tired of greedy, lying bullies.

Kind words: A gift of thoughtfulness

My how the blog goes wanting when things get busy.

I've been saying nice things to folks lately and the response leads me to write about how a few kind words can really help a person make it to the next step or pass a difficult hurdle. My few short acts of kindness have all been very wonderfully rewarded by kind thanks in return.

I feel the connection. Even in the multi-task world of twit, fb, YouTube, and Rush Limbaugh we can find kindnesses changing the face of our relationships and our communities. Make an effort to find kind things to say to your online or face-2-face friends. Every kindness grows a new connection.

Shared life: When we began to change our social gifts

Our culture changed fundamentally when we started to mate for life. I haven't read any dating of this but, I'll guess mating for life started around the time of art, spirituality, language and larger groups (150-200 adult individuals or more) cooperating. I'll also guess that the true shared life is only possible when, to paraphrase Rilke, "we become the guardian of each other's solitude." 

To put this period in perspective, I'll guess it started to emerge from the large brained creature living between 200, 000 and 70,000  years ago. I think mimicry had had its effect on our brains. I think the corpus collosum was sufficiently developed and sexually dimorphous that our social needs met our phenotype needs to push us to mate-for-life scenarios. (it would be interesting to study brains of other mate-for-life creatures and compare them to us alongside our fidelity rates could make a really interesting graphic.) In short, I believe that we learned to live with another for life over an evolutionarily brief period starting about 200,000 years ago lasting to about 70,000 years ago.

I believe we learned our amazing ability to "see the world thru others eyes" during this critical period. Two solid ice ages put us in the mood to mate for life. And, why not? It's an easy way to make and care for offspring that you're "sure or pretty sure are yours." This is also the beginning of our top notch empathy skills (I wrote about empathy in May) Our shared life is our interconnected life. We become dependent and humans are no longer solely individuals. We cannot really be evaluated or judged without consideration for our place in society. 

Sharing life with others is truly a gift we must always give and give well!

What about talking? Gifts in story.

I talked in my St Pat's Day post about Language. Now I've been learning some things about communications that lead me to think the gift of story goes back further. 

Primates of many types understand and respond to language in amazing ways. Many mammals can learn to respond to aural stimuli but some chimps gather the meaning of numerous words and are able to understand them even when they're put together in unique, new ways! Watching a chimp carry a TV out of the enclosure to the prompt, "Can you bring the TV outside?" was instructional. We know that birds understand words and learn to create unique sequences. We know that recent experiments have placed the gene for language into mice. We know that most mammals experience emotions, some as complex as human emotions. So, when are we going to let them vote?

People turned this ability for language into an entirely new thing. I can relate a story or idea to you in a few words and if you grasp the concepts behind the story, you can repeat the story without remembering or even using any of my words. If you know more than one language you most likely can translate my story. This is how human culture has created a new life form on earth. Society. Human society exists as a living organism separate from the individuals that make it up. We've created a monster be allowing a new replicator -like genes- to participate in our culture. The meme builds languages to allow for easier replication of these conceptual life forms.

Wow, we've really got it good don't we?

Eccrine sweat glands: A new sensitivity & mobility.

Round about 2,000,000 years ago our ancestors were moving across the landscape, out of the forests, running long distances, collecting tool material, exploiting the midday period when quadripeds soaked too much heat to be active. This meant we needed to dissipate heat ourselves. What better way than a network of two to four million eccrine sweat cells spread across the surface of our skin? By that time most of our sweat glands were on our palms and soles. They originally provided moisture for better grip when fleeing or fighting and were emotionally activated. Since we started to stand upright, exploit the midday times when most quadripeds rested our species evolved any sweat glands that activate based on heat. Now most sweat glands are used solely to dissipate heat. 

I'm amazed by simple seeming innovations to our genotype that end up providing a real advantage to us as individuals. I'm also amazed at how memotypes sometimes work to overcome innovations as in the development of antiperspirants and deodorants. 

Empathy: The first gift of human civilization

IT has to be said as the elected "nay sayers" in Congress start to sing their chorus against any Supreme Court Justice nominee who might have empathy: our ability to see the world thru the eyes of others was the beginning of our transition from cold blooded, killers and procreators to the civilized people we are today.  Yes, empathy, the gift of being able to put yourself into the shoes of others. 

Without being able to see the world thru others eyes we never learn to communicate. We never learn to care for our children, we never learn to govern, we never learn human emotion. Many mammals have an ability for empathy but, it our finely tuned skill at being able to understand what another creature, not just another human, is experiencing that unlocked most of what distinguishes us from reptiles. Empathy allows a mother to nurture her young. Empathy makes mentoring possible. Empathy is a necessary concept behind all economic transactions. 

Please, tell your Republican Senator  your opinion of empathy. It's the foundation of our legal system. From the Ten Commandments to the Koran, to the US Constitution, the primary purpose of these instruments is to codify empathy. Listen to a Senator try and create a dichotomy with Empathy & Legal decision making on opposite sides!

(Why are the the Republicans so opposed to anyone who might display empathy? My guess is John Kyl, the junior Republican Senator from Arizona didn't think before he came up with this amazing way to criticize any potential nominee that our President proposed. 

Of the President, Kyl said, "He believes in justices that have empathy," Kyl said if Obama goes with empathetic judges who do not base their decisions on the rule of law and legal precedents but instead the factors in each case, he would try to block those picks via filibuster.

Had Senator Kyl thought first I'm sure he would have realized the key place empathy holds in our culture, our community, our government, and our civilization.)

It really makes Santa wonder: What are these leaders thinking? Who are they trying to impress? I remember talk about mainstream values and ideas. We are really getting far out of the mainstream if we take empathy, a basic, core aspect of human existence off the table for any potential Supreme Court Nominee.

Greetings from Santa Erik

Gifts: my interesting study traipsing across eons of our shared heritage. I've learned so much about sharing and curiosity that I'm thinking I must report my findings in a quiet corner of the web. I'm hoping this blog will include selected occasional posts with my thinking about our gift economy and the magic of human social interaction.