Of Mockingbirds and Cowbirds

Thought for the day:  Before I can live with other folks, I've got to live with myself. The one thing that doesn't abide by majority rule is a person's conscience. [Harper Lee]

Receiving the Presidential Medal of Freedom, 2005 [wikipedia]

Nelle Harper Lee had strong opinions about right, wrong, and the role of conscience, but she never sought fame or fortune. In 1964, she said,

I never expected any sort of success with "Mockingbird." I was hoping for a quick and merciful death at the hands of the reviewers but, at the same time, I sort of hoped someone would like it enough to give me encouragement. Public encouragement. I hoped for a little, as I said, but I got rather a whole lot, and in some ways, this was just about as frightening as the quick merciful death I'd expected. 

Last week, Ms. Lee passed away peacefully in her sleep, so she finally got that merciful death she was talking about, but whether she wanted it or not, she also got plenty of attention over the years because of her book, too. She never wanted to be in the limelight, but ever since To Kill a Mockingbird was published to great critical acclaim in 1960, she's been one of the most celebrated and beloved writers of our time. She rarely gave interviews or made public appearances, but she did accept numerous awards and honorary degrees over the years, beginning with the Pulitzer Prize for literature in 1961... but she adamantly refused to make a speech while accepting them. As she put it, Well, it's better to be silent than to be a fool. 

But she most definitely was not a fool. In 1964, when a school board in Virginia wanted to ban her book on the grounds of it being immoral literature, she wrote them the following letter:


Recently I have received echoes down this way of the Hanover County School Board's activities, and what I've heard makes me wonder if any of its members can read.

Surely it is plain to the simplest intelligence that To Kill a Mockingbird spells out in words of seldom more than two syllables a code of honor and conduct, Christian in its ethic, that is the heritage of all Southerners. To hear that the novel is 'immoral' has made me count the years between now and 1984, for I have yet to come across a better example of doublethink.

I feel, however, that the problem is one of illiteracy, not Marxism. Therefore I enclose a small contribution to the Beadle Bumble Fund that I hope will be used to enroll the Hanover County School Board in any first grade of its choice.

(Isn't that letter GREAT???

In a 2011 interview, longtime family friend Reverend Thomas Butts revealed what Lee, or Nelle, as her friends knew her, had told him regarding why she had never written another book: 

Two reasons: one, I wouldn't go through the pressure and publicity I went through with "To Kill a Mockingbird" for any amount of money. Second, I have said what I wanted to say, and I will not say it again. 

So isn't it kind of surprising that she agreed to last year's publication of the re-discovered manuscript of her Go Set a Watchman? In essence, it isn't a sequel to Mockingbird, but rather, an early, unpolished draft of Mockingbird itself. I haven't read it, and don't know if I ever will, because I don't think I want to see Atticus Finch portrayed as a racist. How about you? Any of you read it? If you have, I'd love to know what you think.

May Nelle Harper Lee rest in peace, happily out of the limelight, and may her Mockingbird continue to inspire readers for many generations to come. Here are some of her more memorable quotes:

• You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view... until you climb inside of his skin and walk around in it.
• Real courage is when you know you're licked before you begin, but you begin anyway and see it through, no matter what.
• Until I feared I would lose it, I never loved to read. One does not love breathing.
• I think there's one kind of folks. Folks.
• Sometimes, the Bible in the hand of one man is worse than the whiskey bottle in the hand of another... There are just some kind of men who're so busy worrying about the next world, they've never learned to live in this one.
• People generally see what they look for, and hear what they listen for.
• People in their right minds never take pride in their talents.
• You just hold your head high, and keep those fists down. No matter what anybody says to you, don't you let 'em get your goat. Try fightin' with your head for a change. 

*******************

Do you remember the significance of the mockingbird in Ms. Lee's book? It is described as a songbird that does nothing but bring pleasure to people, and Atticus told Scout it's a sin to kill one of them. Within the context of the book, the mockingbird has most commonly been recognized as a symbol for innocence. 

photo by Galawebdesing [wikipedia]

Which brings me to the other part of this post. The cowbird part. Not saying those birds are inherently guilty, but they do lay their eggs in the nests of other birds, relieving them of the responsibilities of nest-building and raising their young. (I realize some mockingbirds do the same, but for the sake of argument, let's ignore that inconvenient little fact for now, shall we?) 

Now then, let's talk about cowbird-like people. You know, the ones who can't be bothered to raise their children in a responsible manner. John Rosemond, who writes a syndicated column on parenting, recently wrote an excellent article about the rights of children. According to him, one of those rights is to not be protected from the consequences of their actions. You've gotta know who I'm thinking about here. Ethan Couch, the privileged teenager who killed four people while driving under the influence of alcohol and drugs, and faced scant consequences, because of his Affluenza defense, which essentially claimed his (cowbird) parents had coddled him into a sense of irresponsibility. I've already written two posts about this case and his flight to Mexico after breaking his probation, so I won't belabor it now, but I wanted to give you a quick update. Shortly after I wrote the last post about him, he stopped fighting extradition, and was returned to the States. Last Friday, he appeared before a Texas judge, who ruled that the case WILL be handled in adult court this time. That means he will most likely be sentenced to four months or so behind bars before resuming his ten years of probation, and if he breaks probation again, he could get up to ten years in jail for each of the people he killed. For now, he is being held in maximum security, and in solitary confinement for 23 hours out of 24. Think he's taking it seriously now? With any luck, maybe, just maybe, he will develop the kind of conscience Harper Lee so famously wrote about. For his sake, I sincerely hope so.

                                                        Okay, bye... gotta fly!

                                Until next time, take care of yourselves. And each other. 

I'm Still Not Buying It

Thought for the day:  The very rich are different from you and me. [F. Scott Fitzgerald]

Yeah, big bucks often make a huge difference in the way people behave, and not always in a positive direction. For some, it's as though they were born with a perpetual winning poker hand stuffed up their sleeve, so they don't even bother to put any effort into playing the game fairly. If they commit a crime, the results too often disprove the axiom that all people are equal under the law.

Lawyers believe a man is innocent until proven broke. [Robin Hall]

Two years ago, I wrote the post I'm Not Buying It, about affluenza, and in particular, how it was successfully used as a defense in a murder trial. If you missed it, or don't remember it, you might want to go check it out before reading this follow-up.

Go ahead... I'll wait.

No? Okay, if you don't want to be bothered to read the earlier post, no biggie. In a nutshell, while inebriated on beer and valium, a sixteen-year-old boy named Ethan Couch killed four people when he plowed his speeding truck into them. Eleven other people were injured, including some of his friends who were in the truck with him, one of whom will be paralyzed for life. But Couch wasn't concerned. He knew he'd get away with it, because he'd gotten away with every other thing he'd ever done. And he was right; essentially, he did get away with it. See, his lawyer claimed a defense of affluenza, and a psychologist testified that the boy was a product of affluenza, and thus, unable to link his bad behavior with consequences because he had been raised to believe wealth buys privilege. And the judge agreed.

The slap-on-the-wrist punishment rubbed me all kinds of the wrong way, and it did the same to a bunch of you who commented, as well. I wrote: If his so-called affliction was caused by a lack of consequences, how exactly does shielding him yet again from the consequences of his behavior cure that affliction? Talk about the ultimate irony. How will "getting out of it" change his behavior?

Turns out, I was right. It hasn't changed his behavior at all, and Couch is back in the news again. He's still in the midst of serving his ten years' probation, (big whoop!) but recently, a video surfaced of him boozing it up and partying wildly with the assistance of a beer bong. Which is, of course, a probation violation, even for someone who's never faced consequences for a damned thing he's ever done before. It seems his mother didn't want her widdle boy to face consequences this time, either. So the two of them skipped town. Skipped the whole country, as a matter of fact. They threw a bon voyage party of a sort, dyed his hair, slapped a fake beard on him, withdrew thirty thousand dollars (pocket change?) out of the bank, and took off for Mexico.

[wikipedia]

They were caught in a luxury hotel in Puerto Vallarta. I guess they thought it'd be safe to use one of their cell phones to order a pizza, huh?

They thought wrong.

However, the story hasn't ended. Although he remains in police custody in Mexico, his high-dollar lawyers are doing everything they can to prevent extradition. No telling how long it'll take before their stalling tactics run out and he's forced to come back to face the music. Maybe. Maybe for the first time in his life, he will have to pay some consequences.

His mama? She's already been sent back to Texas, where she began belly-aching bitterly about the conditions of the jail cell where she was being held. Earlier this week, she was released on bail. I'm sure she appreciates the accommodations of her home a lot more, but she probably isn't too thrilled with her new less-than-fashionable ankle bracelet.

[morguefile]

Because young Couch will be turning eighteen in the spring, the sheriff and district attorney are trying to have his case transferred to the adult court. Then, affluenza or no affluenza, his long string of luck based on his perpetually winning hand of privilege may finally run out, and the only joker left standing may be... him.

So what do you think? Should he be tried as an adult? Serve time in jail? How about his mother? Should she serve time for taking him out of the country?

Ah yes, the rich truly are different. Like a post I saw on Facebook, most of us weren't raised with a case of affluenza... it was more a case of poorlio.

And you know what? I'd say we're all better off for it.





                                      Until next time, take care of yourselves. And each other.

Am I Missing Something?

Thought for the day:  Everything is funny as long as it's happening to somebody else. [Will Rogers]

Now, let me be the first to say I don't have anything against class clowns. (I mean, heck... I married one!) But the pranks we used to pull in school back in the Dark Ages were... funny. By definition, a prank is a practical joke or mischievous act, and in my opinion, that should translate to something that's creative, humorous, harmless, and legal.

I dunno. Maybe I'm just an old fuddy duddy. But I don't think so; I don't think it's just because I'm growing older.

Heck, I don't even remember much in the way of senior pranks when Smarticus and I graduated from good ol' Dundalk High School. (Which has since been demolished...) Certainly nothing organized on a large-scale, anyhow. Closest thing to that was in junior high, when all the boys in our class would roll up their neckties and unfurl them simultaneously. (Yeah, we were bad asses back then.) Or the whole class would drop and then bend to retrieve a pencil at the same time. It was silly, and mildly amusing, and we only did that sort of thing with teachers who had a sense of humor.

                                                           Remember this song?

I came across that picture of plastic flamingos on morguefile.com, and it reminded me of a prank the youth group at our church used to pull when our boys were teenagers. They'd cover some poor parishioner's lawn with about forty flamingos for a week at a time... and all it took was a small donation to get the gaudy boogers hauled off PDQ. Okay, so technically, you could call that a form of extortion, but it was all in good fun (and fund), and if anyone wanted to opt out of getting bird-bombed, they could do so. (As best as I remember, no one did.)

I'm not sure when it started, but evidently big-time  senior class pranks are standard procedure nowadays. So much so, I even found some websites offering suggestions on pranks students could pull. Stuff like:

• Creating a slip-and-slide in the hallway with a sheet of plastic, a bucket of water and lotion. (Oooh, slick!)
• Lining the walls with post-it notes from floor to ceiling. 
• Blocking stairways with plastic cups turned upside down. (Gotta admit... I like that one!)
• Letting ten crickets loose in the hallways. (HA! Another good un.)
• Turning the cafeteria into a beach scene with tiki torches, beach balls, inflatable palm trees, and a plastic pool filled with sand. 
• Having every senior hide an alarm clock somewhere around the school, set to go off at a random time. (Alarming!)
• Putting petroleum jelly on all doorknobs and handrails. (Another slick one!)

Some websites even offer helpful hints as to senior pranks that can be pulled outdoors. My personal favorite involved placing a huge for sale sign out on the school's front lawn. And these others aren't  too bad, either:

• Writing the graduation year on the front lawn... with cocktail umbrellas, toothpicks, or plastic forks. OR with rock salt, which would kill the grass in the desired pattern. (Which might be frowned upon by the establishment.)
• Painting the year on a rock or hillside with non-toxic paint.
• Hanging bras or jock straps from a tree. (HA!)
• Filling the school fountain with bubble bath, rubber ducks, or food coloring. (School fountain? Must be for wealthy schools.)
• Having a root beer keg party. 
• Having a slumber party on the front lawn.
• Putting something on the flag pole, like tires. (I think it'd be funnier to fly a HUGE pair of panties...)

There was a wee little article in the newspaper recently. In fact, so small, it's a wonder I noticed it at all, but that article is what prompted this blog post. It was about what the paper called a senior class prank, which occurred in New Jersey.

Sixty-two students broke into their high school shortly after 2 AM and proceeded to wreak havoc. (My words, not the paper's.) They did some of the standard balloons and silly string throughout the school, and petroleum jelly on the doorknobs, and they even got a little more creative by taping hot dogs to the lockers. In addition, they overturned and broke furniture, spray-painted grafitti on the walls, and urinated in the hallways. Police responded to the burglar alarm, and all sixty-two students were arrested.

I dunno. Maybe it's just me. Maybe I am an old fuddy-duddy... but how does that behavior qualify as a senior prank? To me, that behavior qualifies as vandalism. Personally, they lost my sympathy with the whole broke into part.

But if you wanta read about pranks... about, in fact, some of the best pranks of all time, check out this old post from April 1. 2011. Now those were some pranks!

So, what do you guys think? Did your senior class pull any pranks? Do tell...

Oh, by the way, an update on an earlier post. Remember the story about affluenza I posted in January? Essentially, it was about a drunk-driving teenager from a privileged background who got away with a virtual slap on the wrist and a stay at a ritzy rehab center for killing four people, and injuring numerous others while driving under the influence. The update? The family of the teenager who was paralyzed for life by that accident sued, as I told you they were planning to do... and they were recently awarded two million dollars. Unfortunately, their son is still paralyzed.

Oh yeah... if you're interested, you'd better hurry: the e-version of Hot Flashes and Cold Lemonade is on sale on Amazon for the paltry sum of ninety-nine cents right now... but only for a couple days.

                                          Until next time, take care of yourselves. And each other.

[Thanks to Wikipedia, morguefile.com and icanhascheezburger.com for the use of their images.]

I'm Not Buying It

Thought for the day:  The very rich are different from you and me.  [F.Scott Fitzgerald]

Well, obviously, people who have enough money to wipe their tushes with hundred-dollar bills have a lot more money than we do, but that isn't the only thing that sets them apart from the rest of us. Numerous studies have shown that the wealthy tend to behave differently, too. And many of them have attitudes of entitlement.

For example, consider these tidbits gleaned from Jim Winokur's book The Rich Are Different: 

*  When Christina Onassis got thirsty, she ordered Diet Coke... to be flown to her by private jet.
* Ivana Trump hated to see footprints on the carpet in her house. In fact, she hated it so much, she wouldn't even enter a room unless the rug was freshly vacuumed.
* The Sultan of Brunei flew the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles to London for his son's ninth birthday. The cost? A cool million bucks.
* Woolworth heiress Barbara Hutton was often carried around by a hunky attendant. When asked why, she said, "Why should I walk when I can hire someone to do it for me?"
* When one-time Time Warner boss Steve Ross flew his wife and two other couples to Mexico for Christmas, the trip required two corporate planes... one for the people, and one for the gifts.
* Donald Trump's 727 had 24-carat gold belt buckles.

Having more money doesn't make you happier. I have fifty million dollars, but I'm just as happy as I was when I had forty-eight million.  [Arnold Schwarzenegger]
              **********************

When I was in elementary school, our principal would often pop into our classroom, and when he did, he usually told us a silly joke. One of those jokes was about a pet parrot named Enza. The family was very distraught because their beloved parrot had escaped through an open window, but the punch line delivered a happy... and corny... ending. When they left the window open again... In Flew Enza. Okay, so he wasn't the world's best comedian, but it's gotta mean something that I can still remember that punch line after all these years.

Well, ya know what you get when you combine  influenza with affluence? You get a whole new word to describe an affliction that strikes only the wealthy: affluenza. 

That word burst into my consciousness this past December, but it actually isn't a new concept. In fact, the term may have been coined as far back as 1954, and PBS ran a special by that name in 1997. British psychologist Oliver James defined the term several years ago as placing a high value on money, possessions, appearances, and fame. In their 2006 book, called Affluenza: When Too Much is Never Enough, Australian psychologists Clive Hamilton and Richard Denniss concluded that wealth causes over-consumption and materialism, and inevitably leads those poor little rich kids to self-medicate with booze and drugs.

Some people made a teensy bit of fun at the idea of affluenza:

But this past December, the unthinkable happened. It was used as a defense in a criminal trial.

Was this a case of the scales of justice being blatantly tipped to favor the wealthy? You decide.

The case: Sixteen-year-old Texan Ethan Couch and seven of his friends stole and drank two cases of beer. The other boys allegedly begged Couch to slow down, but he was still driving the pickup truck thirty MPH over the speed limit when he plowed into four people at the side of the road. And killed them. Eleven others were injured. Two of his friends were thrown from the bed of the truck, one of whom will be paralyzed for the rest of his life. Couch? He fled on foot, yelling, "I'm Ethan Couch! We'll get out of this." Three hours after the accident, his blood alcohol level still measured three times the legal limit, and a trace of valium lingered in his blood.

Bottom line, he was right. He did get out of it. This wasn't his first run-in with the law, either. He'd already been charged with underage drinking before, and he was found with an unconscious, undressed fourteen year-old girl in his truck, too. The consequences? Nuttin, honey.

It's all about the affluenza. His lawyer said he suffers from it, and needed rehabilitation, not prison. G. Dick Miller, a psychologist hired by the family, said the boy was a product of affluenza, and thus, unable to link his bad behavior with consequences because he had been raised to believe wealth buys privilege.

I'm not buying it, but evidently the judge did. She sentenced him to alcohol rehabilitation and ten years' probation. The posh California rehab center looks like a resort... and will cost the family almost half a million dollars a year.

So, I ask you, if his so-called affliction was caused by a lack of consequences, how exactly does shielding him yet again from the consequences of his behavior cure that affliction? Talk about the ultimate irony. How will getting out of it change his behavior?

And if essentially what is an innocent by reason of wealth is a valid defense, shouldn't innocent by reason of poverty be a valid plea as well? If a kid can get a slap on the wrist for being over-privileged, doesn't an under-privileged kid deserve the same consideration?

Lawyers believe a man is innocent until proven broke.  [Robin Hall]

Yeah, right. I wouldn't give a plug nickel's chance of that ever working. Matter of fact, in 2012, the same judge who sentenced Couch to rehab and probation sentenced another fourteen-year-old to ten years in juvenile detention. He punched a man, and the man fell, hit his head, and died. That young man was black. Okay, so that may not have had anything to do with the ruling, but let's just say... he wasn't named Ethan Couch. And I doubt very seriously if he or his family were troubled with an overabundance of funds.

And so it goes.

                                               So what do you think...?

                          Until next time, take care of yourselves. And each other.