The Third Wave

The Wave
Gustave Courbet
1869

In 1967, at Cubberley High School in Palo Alto, California, a history teacher by the name of Ron Jones conducted a social experiment that became known as "The Third Wave". I had not heard about this experiment until a couple of days ago, when I saw the documentary entitled "Lesson Plan" on PBS. It was fascinating. During the experiment, Jones told his students that the movement aimed to eliminate democracy. Jones felt that democracy emphasizes individuality and therefore was a drawback to society as a whole.  He emphasized this by coining the motto: "Strength through discipline, strength through community, strength through action, strength through pride" and he had his students chant this over and over until they were indoctrinated.

The Stormy Sea
Gustave Courbet
1870

The experiment began as an exercise in discipline, with the students being told to sit up straight, behave in an orderly fashion, and address the teacher as "Mr. Jones". He made up a salute, and students were ordered to salute each other even outside of class. Everyone complied. And then a strange thing happened; the experiment took on a life of its own, and students who were not in the class wanted to join. His classroom went from 30 students to 200, with standing room only. The students were issued a membership card, and some of the students elected themselves to be "police" or "informers". Mr. Jones was amazed to find that some of the students started reporting to him when other members of the movement failed to abide by the rules. Anyone who broke the rules, or spoke up and said, "This is wrong", were immediately banished to the library, and were shunned by their fellow classmates.

La falaise d'Étretat
Gustave Courbet
1869

By the fourth day of the experiment, Mr. Jones was alarmed at how the students had become immersed in the experiment, and rather than thinking as individuals, they were thinking and acting only according to the rules of the community, with loyalty only to the group ~~ complete with discipline, a membership card and a salute.  Individuality disappeared.  But the really frightening thing was how many people wanted to join the group, and fights were breaking out all over the campus when folks disagreed with each other, so Mr. Jones terminated the experiment.  However, even today, when the students are interviewed, they remember the feelings they had of joining the group, and then being afraid to be individuals.  They were merely part of the whole, and once they were part of the whole, they were terrified of taking a wrong step and being banished.  Folks would say and do things they no longer believed, just to remain part of the group.

Beach in Normandy
Gustave Courbet
1872

A year after the experiment, Mr. Jones was terminated from his employment, and he never taught again. But his experiment was successful in proving how peer pressure can be very similar to Nazi Germany, and that was the point of his experiment. The definition of peer pressure is: the influence exerted by a peer group in encouraging a person to change his or her attitudes, values, or behavior in order to conform to group norms. Social groups affected include membership groups, when the individual is "formally" a member (for example, political party, trade union), or a social clique. A person affected by peer pressure may or may not want to belong to these groups. They may also recognize dissociative groups with which they would not wish to associate, and thus they behave adversely concerning that group's behaviors.

Mr. Jones' experiment proved to be more enlightening than he first imagined.  It also proved that perfectly normal, reasonable people can get caught up in this mindset, and since we are all human, it can happen to any one of us, at any time.  The thing is to recognize it for what it is and to try to avoid it.  It's not always easy, though.

Come Fly With Me...

In the past couple of months years or so, I haven't been watching much television, mainly because there hasn't been anything worth watching. Reality shows bore the tar out of me. I mean, if I have to make a decision between watching Nancy Grace tip-toeing her way through "Dancing with the Stars", or reading a good book, the book will win every time. I have been paying a fortune to rent movies on Video on Demand, because ... well ... it's better than keeping up with the Kardashians. I have never seen a group of more intellectually challenged, one-dimensional people, as exist in that family. Why in Heaven's name would I want to *keep up* with them? How do these people even get on television, and moreover, who watches them?  So I was extremely happy to discover a whole raft of new television shows this year, of great quality, fabulous actors, and wonderful performances.  Each one of them is like watching threatre-quality productions.  So, here, in no particular order, is a list of television shows that I highly recommend:

1.  Boardwalk Empire with the absolutely fabulous Steve Buscemi. This is actually its second year, but I just discovered it.

2.  Harry's Law with Kathy Bates.  Yes, that Kathy Bates.  On television.  I would pay to watch that show.

3.  Revenge with the wonderfully wicked Madeleine Stowe. She's scheming, she conniving, she's fabulous.

4.  Body of Proof with Dana Delaney.  It's sort of CSI with high heels and great clothes ~~ and wonderful acting.

5.  Unforgettable with Poppy Montgomery.  This is based on the story of a woman who has total recall, and one of the advisors on the program is Marilu Henner, who has total recall.

6.  Terra Nova with Jason O'Mara, an extremely talented, Shakespearean-trained British actor.  The executive producter of Terra Nova is Steven Spielberg, and it is top-notch quality.

7.  Pam Am with Christina Ricci ~ yes, that Christina Ricci.  The show is about  a group of Pan Am stewardesses ~ yes, stewardesses ~ in the early 1960s.  It's so well-done, you can hear Sinatra singing, "Come fly with me..." in the background.  We get to go to London, Paris, Rome, New York, Berlin ...  Fasten your seat belts.

When I come home in the evening and plop myself into my big cozy chair, I don't want to turn on the television and watch some poor, unfortunate person in some cat and rat-infested home being evicted because he or she can't get rid of all the hoarded junk.  And I don't want to watch all the Z list ex-celebrities (Lindsay Lohan's father...?) throwing hissy fits on Dr. Drew's Celebrity Rehab.  And I certainly don't want to watch anyone else's children.  I want escape.  I want to be entertained.  I want to be transported to 1920s Atlantic City, or 1960s Rome, or even 85 million years BC.

Come Fly With Me...

The Miracle Of Life... Is Cheap

Anyone who knows me, knows that I am vehemently anti-abortion. My views are not on religious grounds, but strictly on humanitarian grounds. I believe the chance that life exists anywhere else in the universe is slim to none. I believe it exists only on our planet, and it happened accidentally.  When you really think about the odds against your mother or your father being conceived, and then your being conceived as a result, and in fact any human being conceived at all, it is phenomenal that we are sitting here today, in front of our computers.  It is indeed a miracle.

All of the things we are ever going to be, are present at the moment of our conception ~~ blue eyes, brown eyes, tall, short ~~ whatever. The creature that sits in front of your computer today was created at the moment of conception. We are a combination of our father's and mother's DNA. "Oh, you have your mother's nose! Oh, you look like your father!"  We cannot change it.  To paraphrase Popeye, we are what we are.  And so, I believe when we abort a human fetus, we are aborting a human being, not a blob of tissue, but a human being who has been given only one ~~ one ~~  chance at life.

Today as I was puttering around my tree house, I happened to catch a show with Anderson Cooper, about black market babies. Wait a minute ... did I hear that correctly? Babies being sold on the black market? How did that happen? Well, it turns out that so many babies are being aborted, there are none available for adoption to loving parents who want children. So, as a result of supply and demand, babies are actually being manufactured and sold on the black market. Let me get this straight. We legally kill babies and then we manufacture more and sell them. Does anyone else find that bizarre and creepy? And perhaps just a little bit immoral?

Now, please don't misunderstand me. I am not against birth control. This is the 21st Century, and there are about a kazillion ways to prevent a human being from actually being conceived. But once he or she has been conceived, well, that train has pretty much left the station, has it not? Except in dire circumstances, and perhaps with the help of adoption agencies, how inconconvenient would it be to carry the child to term, and then arrange to have it adopted by parents who are longing to have a child, and would love and cherish it?

Ever since Roe versus Wade, abortion of human fetuses has legally been used as a method of birth control. Why can't the human race rethink the whole process and call it conception control? And while we're at it, why can't we put more of the onus of conception control on the male, and not just the female? How about it gentlemen ... a birth control pill for men? After all, it does take two to tango.  Or is this another one of these deals where the responsibility of it is left to the woman, including the pain ~~ physical and mental.  And I don't want to think about what the fetus must feel.  In Canada, a woman can get an abortion at five months, and in the U.K. it's six months.  That's a full-fledged human being.

Life is cheap, isn't it ~~ as long as it's someone else's.

Once Upon A Time... Two For The Road

Woman in the Garden
Claude Monet
1867

Do you ever wish you could wave a magic wand, and go back to a simpler time in your life?  I have been thinking about that lately. I'm not depressed or unhappy, I'm just sort of ... well, I can't describe it. Disappointed, I guess.  I have always been an optimistic, cup half-full type of person. I never look at anything from the negative point of view, but recently I have been surrounded by people who do ~~ co-workers, family ~~ and it's frustrating.   I would like to go back to a time when my life was full of possibilities, not only for me, but for other people too.  I remember that time, and it seems so long ago now.

Yesterday I watched a biography of Audrey Hepburn.  What a lovely, gracious woman she was.  Henry Mancini composed many of the songs for her movies. I once owned an album of Mancini's movie themes, and my favourite was from a movie with Audrey Hepburn and Albert Finney called "Two for the Road".  I played the song over and over ... and I never tired of hearing it.  When I heard it again yesterday, it took me back to a time when my life was simple and full of hope.  But the lyrics mean even more to me today than they did then.  It's poignant and beautiful, and makes me think that, wherever the road goes, there is still hope and all sorts of wonderful things waiting just around the corner, for everyone.

The 21st Century ... The World According To Jobs

When I was about eight years old, my friend Harry Jensen and I made a tin can telephone. My friend Harry was wonderful; we were both born on the same day in the same hospital, and he was like a kindred spirit. Harry taught me all the secret things of the "boy's world" ~~ how to do arm-pit farts, how to set off a whole strip of caps from a cap gun, how to whistle with a piece of grass, how to make ~~ and throw ~~ the perfect snowball, and so much more. But the tin can telephone was my favourite. Harry lived in the house just behind ours, and the string on the tin can telephone was just long enough so that we could chat between his kitchen and my kitchen. Of course, we were shouting so loud, we could probably hear each other anyway. The tin can telephone was great fun.

When I became a teenager, my parents gave me a Princess Telephone for Christmas. I could chat with my friends, and my very first boyfriend, who always called me on my Princess Telephone so I could help him with his homework.  I thought my Princess Telephone was just The . Best . Thing I could ever have received.  It was my doorway to my independent world.  My parents allowed me to talk on the telephone, in my bedroom with the door closed.  I now officially had my own life and my own secrets that I shared with my friends without my Parental Units being involved. 

My other prized possession was my very own radio, which I kept beside my bed, and I could listen to radio stations as far away as California. To me, California was the centre of the universe. It was where everything was happening ~~ movies, beaches, music, rock and roll. To be listening to a radio station live from California was to have finally arrived in the land of cool.  I was a fully paid-up teenager with my own telephone, my own friends, my own radio and my own music.  Did it get any better than that?

Omigoodness, have we come a long way...?  When Steve Jobs passed away the other day, I began reading about some of his innovations.  He was a true visionary, and he changed the way we live ~~ forever.  Now, our lives are completely portable.  Everything we have, know, need, listen to or communicate with, is in a little device we carry in our pockets.  This device has revolutionized the world in ways that we wouldn't have thought possible a generation ago.   Absolutely everything ~~ everything ~~ is connected, and we can take it with us when we leave the house.  It makes me dizzy...  And the thing that impressed me most about Steve Jobs is what an amazing marketer he was.  He created devices that we didn't know we needed, and then he showed us how much we could not live without them, and then he sold them to us.  We had a truly symbiotic relationship with Steve Jobs and the devices he created for us.  Is that genius, or what?

I'm wondering what other visionaries there are waiting in the wings, creating wonderful things that we don't even know yet that we need, we cannot live without ...how did we ever live without...

Armchair Travel ... Rome, The Eternal City

In recent years, Vancouver has been voted the number one city in which to live, and at the same time it has been voted the city with the third worst fashion sense in the world. I think the truth lies somewhere in between. I have been to Paris, London and New York, and Vancouver cannot hold a candle to them for culture, architecture, lifestyle ~~ well, just about anything. Vancouver is fortunate to be situated in a beautiful location, but it's a fairly young city and has not yet really established any sense of style.  In fact, it's really just an overgrown logging town / port, located between the mountains, the old growth forest and the ocean.  We do, however, have one of the sexiest beaches in North America.  Who knew...!  Perhaps that's the reason for the poor fashion sense...  yoga pants, blue jeans, sneakers and baseball caps.  Did I mention yoga pants...?

Every year at this time, I dream of faraway places with strange-sounding names... Well, maybe not the strange-sounding names, but definitely the faraway places. This year I am dreaming of Rome. How wonderful it would be to wake up tomorrow morning, and fly off to Rome. Now there is a city with style and elegance, not to mention incredible architecture, antiquities, art and history.  I would visit all the usual places ~~ the plazas, the Sistine Chapel and the museums, the Colosseum and the Pantheon ~~ oh goodness, there is too much to even mention here.  Mostly I would soak in the ambience of the city, not to mention the food and wine.

And then I would swing over to Milan and see the fresco of Leonardo da Vinci's The Last Supper. Just think, being able to see the frescos in the Sistine Chapel in Rome, and The Last Supper in Milan. Do we have anything to compare here in Vancouver? Well, yes, if you include the graffiti underneath the Granville Bridge... Then I would have an espresso at Caffè Cova, an ancient Milanese coffeehouse founded in 1817 near the Teatro alla Scala. Oh, goodness. And then I would spend the afternoon strolling through the fashion district. I couldn't afford to buy anything, but I could look.

*sigh*

Armchair travel is wonderful, but not as good as the real thing.  If someone were to give you an open airline ticket, and you could go anywhere in the world, right now, where would you go?  Would it be a warm topical island?  Or would it be a cosmopolitan city bustling with culture and night life?  Enquiring minds want to know.

Does It Even Get Any Weirder...?

There are some thing in life that are so weird, we just accept them. For me, the life and death of Michael Jackson is one of those things. Jackson was arguably one of the most talented entertainers who ever lived. His "Thriller" album is still hard to beat, even 30 years later. Every time I listen to it, it still sounds fresh and innovative. But, unfortunately, Jackson was a very strange person, and his private life reflected that fact. I was never entirely convinced that his preoccupation with little boys was anything more than just friendship. Child molesters will often create an atmosphere where children feel comfortable, and in my opinion, Jackson's Neverland Ranch was a typical child molester's lair. If anyone in any of our neighbourhoods ~~ Mr. Smith or Mr. Jones down the street ~~ had participated in such behaviour, the outcome of the trials would have been much different. If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck... But Jackson is gone, and we will never know for sure.

And now, his personal physician, Dr. Murray, is on trial for Jackson's strange death ~~ yet another trial involving the strange life and death of Michael Jackson. At the time of his death, Jackson had been given propofol (an anesthetic), and two anti-anxiety benzodiazepines ~~ lorazepam and midazolam ~~ to help him sleep. During the autopsy, midazolam, diazepam, lidocaine and ephedrine were also found in Jackson's body. Now Dr. Murray is charged with involuntary manslaughter, and he is also accused of using the wrong type of CPR to try to revive Jackson. Weird? No more so than the rest of Jackson's life.

Jackson's career was on a downhill slide at the time of his death. He had been trying to revive it, but I think as with everything in life, times moves on, and fresh, new weird things arrive on the scene. Lady Gaga, anyone? Consider this: Lady Gaga wasn't even "born this way" yet when "Thriller" was first released. She was born four years later.

In a way, Jackson's weird death is his immortality. His death revived his record sales, and he has stayed front and center on the scene in a ghoulish way for the past two years, and will probably continue to do so for a long time yet. There is no such thing as bad publicity. Was his "Thriller" album prescient? Did he have a sense of what was to happen? Who knows? As long as Dr. Murray's trial continues, Michael Jackson will be in the headlines every day. His corpse will continue to be dug up and examined every morning, and laid to rest again in the evening. Every detail of his life, eating habits, sleep, friends, family, recreation, medications ~~ all his privacy ~~ will be open for the world to examine. I ask you, does it get any weirder than that?

Darkness falls across the land
The midnight hour is close at hand
Creatures crawl in search of blood
To terrorize y'alls neighborhood
And whosoever shall be found
Without the soul for getting down
Must stand and face the hounds of hell
And rot inside a corpse's shell

I'm gonna thrill you tonight
(Thriller thriller)
I'm gonna thrill you tonight
(Thriller night thriller))
I'm gonna thrill you tonight
Ooh babe I'm gonna thrill you tonight
Thriller night babe

The Balance Sheet

Do you ever get the feeling sometimes that somewhere, there is a room full of accountants keeping a ledger or a balance sheet of your life?  And do you ever get the feeling sometimes that the debits far outweight the credits?  I have been feeling that way lately.  My mother once told me that she thought of me as a catalyst. "Cat·a·lyst: One that precipitates a process or event, especially without being involved in or changed by the consequences."  How did I get to be that way?  I don't know, but I do know it is tiring.  I enjoy having fun in my life as much as anyone, but fun seems to be towards the bottom the credit column.  In fact, I would say I'm in the red.  I have never been the sort of person for whom other folks like to "do" things.  I am always the one who "does".  A few weeks ago a good friend of mine said to me, "If you ever want to go anywhere on the weekend, and you need a car, please let me know.  I know it's difficult to get around the Lower Mainland if you don't have a car, and I'm happy to help out."  I was in shock.  People just never make offers to me like that.  In fact, I would never feel comfortable accepting her offer, but it's sort of like the Oscars, you know?  It's wonderful just to be nominated.

How does one become an enjoyer of life?  I need some lessons.  What I would really like to do is to quit my job and spend a life of dissipation and debauchery.  Well, maybe not debauchery, but a little bit of dissipation would be nice.  I would love to spend every waking moment, just enjoying the pleasures the day had to offer.  A day at the spa?  Bring it on.  Win a lottery and spend six months on a tropical island?  I'm there.  Hire a housekeeper to vacuum and dust while I sip coffee?  *Deep sigh...*

A couple of days ago I was ~~ yet again ~~ kept awake all night by the noisy neighbours.  A developer by the name of Robert Helgason purchased the house next door and renovated it in 2004.  He split the house into three suites, and then lied to the City of Vancouver Planning department, saying that it was only two suites (a duplex), and thereby got away with renting it out.  It is in fact three suites, and nine very noisy people live there.  It is the bane of my existance.  It is the thing that tipped the balance sheet for me.  Can you see the bay window on the left behind the trellis?  That is my bedroom, and it is less than ten feet away from party central.  The City of Vancouver Planning Department is within walking distance of where I work, and I think I will pay them a visit.  I'm very resourceful, but I'm also sort of like The Incredible Hulk.  "Don't make me angry; you wouldn't like me when I'm angry..."

The balance sheet is long overdue for the credits and the debits of my life to be put into balance.  I'll never be a pampered princess, like one of the housewives of Beverly Hills/Spuzzum/Pouce Coupé, but I'm ready for some fun.  I'm fairly low maintenance and it doesn't take much to make me happy.  However, right now my account is empty and I'm taking donations.

Is There A Vaccination Against Ignorance...?

Edward Jenner Vaccinating a Boy
Eugene Ernest Hillemacher

In this age of global travel, can you imagine a world where smallpox still exists?  The world would be a very different place, one that I cannot even imagine.  The whole dynamic of travel would be very different from the one we experience now.  As with the threats of terrorism, many of our freedoms would be in jeopardy, not to mention our lives.  Smallpox was a scourge on humanity, a highly infectious communicable disease that killed over one-third of the people it infected, and left the survivors horribly disfigured.  Just in the 20th century alone, smallpox was responsible for an estimated 500 million deaths.

In 1796 an English physician by the name of Edward Jenner noticed that milkmaids who had been exposed to cowpox, did not develop smallpox. Jenner took the fluid from a cowpox pustule on a dairymaid's hand and inoculated an 8-year-old boy. Six weeks later, he exposed the boy to smallpox, and the boy did not develop smallpox, but remained well. Jenner coined the term "vaccine" from the word "vaca" which means "cow" in Latin. By 1800 about 100,000 people had been vaccinated worldwide. After vaccination campaigns throughout the 19th and 20th centuries, the World Health Organization certified the eradication of smallpox in 1979. One of the scourges of mankind no longer exists.

Now, can you imagine a world without cancer? Scientists have long believed that many cancers are the result of viral infections, and if so, a vaccine can be developed to prevent those cancers. Can you imagine ~~ a vaccination against cancer? Another of the scourges of mankind could be eradicated, or at least greatly reduced. Well, such a vaccine exists right now. It is called Gardasil, and it protects folks from cancers that develop after they have been exposed to certain types of human papillomavirus (HPV), specifically HPV types 6, 11, 16 and 18. HPV types 16 and 18 cause an estimated 70% of cervical cancers, and are responsible for most HPV-induced anal, vulvar, vaginal, and penile cancers. Farah Fawcett died of anal cancer at the age of 61. It is a horrible disease, and she died a horrible, protracted death.

Newflash: Human sexuality is here to stay, and unfortunately, along with it the sexually transmitted infections (STIs) are here to stay as well. And here is the shocking news: Of the 18.9 million new cases of STIs each year, 9.1 million (48%) occur among 15- to 24-year-olds, even though this age group represents only one-quarter of the sexually active population. According to a 2008 study by the CDC, an estimated 1 in 4 teenage girls has at least one STI at any given time.

There has been a lot of backlash against Gardasil in recent weeks ~~ thank you Michele Bachmann ~~ and I think it is unbelievably ignorant. It's not a moral issue, it's a medical issue. If there are opportunities to save millions of lives, how can anyone disagree with that? Vaccines have side effects? Oh, gosh, well, so do smallpox and cancer, the main side effect being death, the second side effect being permanent disfigurement. The smallpox vaccine was not without side effects and in a few cases, approximately 2 in one million, the side effects were severe. But if you really want to know the pros and cons of those odds, ask someone who has had smallpox or cancer.

Every human being on earth should be vaccinated with Gardasil, before they become sexually active. Period. Full stop. End of story. I feel very strongly about this, and I hope the scope of ignorance represented by people like Michele Bachmann will also be eradicated as soon as possible. Is there a vaccination against ignorance? Oh, how I wish...

Miss Jones and Mrs. Winters ... Worlds Apart

Now that school has started again for another year, I have been thinking lately about some of my teachers throughout the years. My favourite teacher was Miss Jones, my grade one teacher. I thought she was the sweetest, most beautiful, most intelligent person I had ever met. She was patient and gentle with all of the children. I remember one little boy ~~ Bobby ~~ who, it turned out, was severely intellectually challenged. He was a good-natured boy and everyone liked him, but the school work was beyond his intellectual capacity. He disappeared one day, several weeks into the school year, and we never saw him again. Miss Jones explained to us that Bobby had gone to a special school. I remember she had tears in her eyes when she told us, but we were too young to understand.  A few years ago we had a school reunion, and Miss Jones was there, much older but still very pretty.  It was wonderful to see her.  She hugged me and said she remembered what a cute little girl I was.  I realize now that Miss Jones was only 21 years old when I was in grade one.

It's amazing how a teacher can have an effect on a child's self-worth.  When I was in grade eight ~~ that alligator-infested swamp of middle school ~~ I had a teacher who didn't particularly like me.  She had three or four *favourites* and the rest of us were just ... well, the rest of us.  She seemed to take great care in pronouncing my name incorrectly, even though I told her several times that it was pronounced this way, not that way.  I realized years later that she was not a particularly inspired teacher, and probably didn't do it deliberately.  But, at an age where girls want to feel accepted by their peers, and by their teachers, she made it blatantly obvious that most of us were not ... just so.  She was very young at the time as well, only 21 or 22, and there is still a huge level of immaturity at that age.  I hope she became wiser in later years.

Mrs. Winters was a jock, and was also the girls' gym teacher.  She was married to the boys' gym teacher, Mr. Winters, and together they produced a gaggle of little jock-children.  I was never a jock.  I enjoyed sports such as ice-skating, bike-riding, hiking, swimming, but I loathed and despised competitive sports.  Oddly enough, however, I was good at baseball, and Mr. Winters said he had never met anyone who could hit a baseball the way I did.  I once hit a ball from the sports field all the way to the gymnasium, and knocked out a window.  Mr. Winters just stood and stared at me in amazement.  I felt that redeemed me somewhat with Mrs. Winters ~~ temporarily, anyway.

A few days ago I ran across Mrs. Winters on Facebook.  I sent her a friendly message, however, I doubt she will remember me, and I don't expect to hear back from her.  She probably would not recognize my name, in any case.  She never could get it right...