First Post: Capire

I've done an experiment over the past few days.  I started liking facebook posts based on the level of articulation of the post, rather than the content.  This means that I liked a bunch of people that I disagreed with, and a bunch of people that I agreed with, but I didn't like anything banal.  It was life-changing, and I think I will adopt the habit.  If I'm lucky, facebook's all-knowing algorithm will see my preferences, and give me better media to peruse.

It says something that I've only posted one article, a "I'm going to start writing now" type.  There was once a time when thought was applauded no matter the content--and when correction was needed, it was polite.  To be fair, that last statement is total crap--there might not have been such a time, I don't really know.  Maybe that time was when I was growing up.

In any case, it's terrifying to post anything these days.  I am legitimately afraid that if I say the wrong word, it could preclude any future in politics, which is something I'm not willing to rule out.  More importantly, it could hurt my career, or even my family.  It is a scary place right now.

We live in the age of deliberate outrage. Manicured righteous indignation is the norm.  We get our politics from huffpo and The Donald, we get our religion from George Takei, and we get our wisdom from Upworthy. We don't have the attention span to read an article without flashing pictures, so if it ain't a listicle, we ain't interested.  America is filled with ideologues.  We all know what's best, and it's always the other guy that's ignorant, intolerant, or bigoted.  We know it all.  It's shocking that everyone else is so ignorant.

This is probably what the 60s felt like.  Behold the death of America as we know it.  'gain.

I read, once, that "I write to find out what I think."  That's a quote from the internet.  The one that has stuck with me, far more, is "good writing is good thinking.  Bad writing is bad thinking.  My job is to teach you to write well, and that is a simple task: to teach you to think well."  That one is from my High School Theory of Knowledge teacher, Dan Campbell.  That one has stuck with me.  The only way to get good at this is to practice.  Lastly, I need to write because "when I want to know what others think, I ask.  When I want to know what I think, I write."  I write to understand myself and others.

I make a pretty terrible rebel.  I'm a tall, very nerdy math teacher.  Yet there is something delightfully countercultural about trying to think things through every once in a while.  Because we worship at the altar of BuzzFeed, it feels devious to reject the status-quo and think about problems from beginning to end. I guess it's my way of being mischievous, though on most days I think of it as a civic duty.

Let me whine a little more before I tell you what I'm doing.  I lament that on facebook, everyone is a peer, and everyone shouts all the time.  There is no such thing as a "quiet" facebook debate.  The fact is, that we don't ever change our minds on anything unless it comes from someone we love and trust, and who has our best interests at heart.  No one changes their mind because facebook.  It doesn't happen.  Because it's impossible to have a vulnerable, loving, honest conversation there.  Even if someone could admit to not knowing it all.

Writing is a brain workout.  It's practice, it helps me think, and it helps make me more thoughtful, more articulate, even more compassionate.

I think I'll try a few things.

1)  I won't have intelligible titles.  Maybe they'll all be Italian.  That should kill the click bait.
2)  It'll be plain text on a boring blog site.  No better way to ensure people are listening for meat, not trappings.
3)  My goal won't be to get readers, but to get smarter.  I like the argument.
4)  One then done.  Editing is the death of every one of my thoughts, and that ends today.  Best I can do, first round.  No more constipation.

We'll see how it goes.  It's a little terrifying to look your own terrifying thinking in the eye.

More importantly, if you're still reading, then you get to keep reading.

Wisdom, most often, is as rare as it is camouflaged.  I've learned that from the mormon temple symbolism.  What you see, if you're careful, is that the ritual doesn't go to great lengths to explain things to you.  You have to hunt down the wisdom yourself.  That's the greatest mouse trap of all.  I haven't yet figured out how to hide the best parts till the end, but I'm going to do my darnedest to try.

An Editorial on Editorials

I think that editorials are the jr. high photos of newspapers.

I can only imagine some editorial board writer sitting around and dragging out the old volumes, looking at them with a mix of fondness and nostalgia.  Some of them are now totally embarrassing.  They make you think "what was I thinking?!"  On the other hand, some of them make you say "I guess I was kind of a stud back then."  You look at all of them with plenty of insecurity, analyzing every detail, and wondering if anyone else notices every single flaw the way you do.

But we take photos to remember good times, too.  Or, perhaps, just to remember.

If I were an anthropologist, I would love to study editorials.  They give a feel for where society is on an issue (or, at least, where one voice in society is on the issue).  By necessity, they tell you what issues are important to what people, and they're always interesting to read.

I'm going to start posting on this blog from time to time so that I can look back at snapshots of how my thought has developed.  I'm pretty sure that I've grown up politically, and at this point my politics won't be changing much.  I hope I'm wrong, though.  And I'd like to document my growth.  I also want to be a better writer, and I think that posting something once every week (or two) will help me get out of my perfection paralysis.  Perhaps most important is something that a high school teacher taught me: good writing is the sign of good thinking, and if you strive to become a better writer, you will, of necessity, become a better thinker.

I reserve the right to be wrong, and even to play the devil's advocate from time-to-time.  My audience is me, so I don't particularly care if you don't care for my style or content, and I'm doing this for selfish reasons.  That being said, if I've invited you to read this, feel free to comment, give your opinion, or give some critical feedback.