A glimpse into the Mind of Mikey

It was early summer, 1977, and I was on my way to the movies… I didn’t know exactly what to expect, but I did have some ideas.

For example, that was back when Freon was the coolant of choice, so theater air conditioners really worked. I knew it would be much cooler inside than outside. Of course, I was in Texas – everywhere was cooler than outside.

I knew my dad would order peanut M&Ms for himself, and a large popcorn for the family to share.

I knew that the movie had something to do with space – and that a couple of my friends had already seen it, and said it was the best thing ever!!!

I was never a very patient person – and that was well before I came to actually look forward to movie previews – but eventually the wait was over.

That opening sequence is permanently etched in the minds of millions of Americans. The sudden explosion of the symphonic theme music. The maddeningly slow pace of the exposition text as it flowed along, introducing us to the Empire and the rebellion. The amazingly realistic spaceship that first came into view – followed by the heart-stopping, jaw-dropping enormity of the Star Destroyer that roared onto the screen.

Even now, at my advanced age (HA!), that scene evokes a strong emotional response… but when I was 9 years old – it was beyond anything I’d experienced.

It was life-changing. It’s difficult to over-estimate the impact the movie had on my thinking.

Evil was a very real thing. Heroism was possible, even if you were a whiny farm boy. Dedicated small groups of people could make a difference, even if the group was made up of an orphan from the sticks, a rogue with questionable ethics, and a snooty and sarcastic princess. Right was more important than might. And robots & big furry critters were cool!

These are things that I didn’t learn from Sunday School, or from Indian Guides, or from Mrs. Krutilek – my super-hot fourth grade homeroom teacher. Maybe I should’ve been able to learn it in those traditional arenas, but I definitely didn’t.

But I did learn it. And in the 35 years since I first saw the movie, I haven’t forgotten it. I’m still not a fan of evil, or empires. I still root for the underdog team. I still really prefer being right. And I love my furry critters.

Star Wars has had an enormous influence over my generation – and over me. You could probably make an argument that its influence was too great, but I might have to argue that point. Just take a quick peek at the news… it’s hard to deny that evil is real, that underdogs are embattled, and that loyalty is rare outside the world of the furry critters. I can think of a LOT of worse things that could influence me.

And so, on this lovely Star Wars Day, let me add my voice to those who have turned what might seem a silly phrase into a timeless benediction:

“May the Force be with you!”

“I am rubber, you are glue…”

“Sticks and stones may break my bones…”

“You’re not the boss of me!”

Over the years, I have often enjoyed the sheer simplicity and transparency of children’s debates. I know that words have power, but never do they hold as much power as they do for kids.

In a lot of ways, this is the epitome of magical thinking. For a child, words can literally alter reality. In the middle of a sweaty, physical game of tag, the phrase “time out” magically puts the world in a state of suspended animation. After a heated bout of name-calling, the phrase “I take it back” can magically produce forgiveness. At just about any time, the words “oh yeah???” can magically transform an angry boy into a master of wit on par with Oscar Wilde or Winston Churchill. And the word “Mom!!”, loudly drawn out into 3 or 4 syllables, can magically end a brawl faster than any known diplomatic technique.

And then we grow up.

Sort of.

There’s nothing like election season to show that we never really grow up.

The magical phrase that I’ve been hearing so much lately is “Yeah, but, well, they did it first!”

It’s been going on for years. For the last couple of years, we’ve been hearing Democrats complaining about the childish, disrespectful, obtuse things Republicans say about President Obama. The magical defense? “Yeah, but, well, you said bad stuff about President Bush!” And then the Democrats say “Yeah, but, well, you said bad stuff about President Clinton!” And then the Republicans come back with “Yeah, but, well, you said bad stuff about President Reagan!” And it goes on and on. Remember back in 1322 BC when supporters of Pharoah Horemheb heiroglyphed “Yeah, but, well, you carved bad stuff about King Tut on that obelisk!”

Classic.

This phenomenon has infamously returned in the latest kerfuffle-du-jour from Rush Limbaugh.

If you’ve somehow managed to miss this story, let me help you out: Rush said some things. Oh, and the “West Indies” turned out to be not India at all, Galileo was right, and we didn’t find green cheese on the moon.

Anyway, as is usually the case, Rush has his defenders… and they seem to be falling into two camps. In one camp, we have the folks who are defending his freedom of speech. Essentially their argument goes something like this:

Rush is an astronomical gas bag (on the level of a red giant) with a catastrophic lack of self-awareness, the empathy of a ball peen hammer, and a wondrously absent ability to discern fact from fiction, context from dirty limericks, and irony from industrial waste… but as long as he doesn’t break any laws, he has the right to say whatever he wants.

I’m with them – the First Amendment is a pretty cool deal, and unlike many politicians and pundits, I don’t think I get to decide which groups of Americans don’t have access to it.

It’s the other group of Rush defenders that have inspired my verbose rant: the ones who resort to the aforementioned childish magical thinking:

How can you be upset at what Rush said? After all, what about Bill Maher or Louis CK or whoever put Michele Bachmann’s googly eyes on that Newsweek cover? They did bad stuff, too!

The point being, other people said/did bad stuff sometime, so that makes what Rush said/did OK.

We could go on and on about logical fallacies and false equivalencies and the principles of rhetoric – but why bother? A person who would sincerely use that kind of argument has fully internalized the magical thinking – which is a very effective innoculation against logic.

The thing is, I’m not entirely convinced that everyone who uses that argument is truly earnest… I believe (or perhaps I should say hope) that many folks are just a bit lazy – or distracted – or busy – or just wanting the conversation to be over. They use the magical words because it’s easy. It’s a habit – they don’t really mean it.

Does the average person truly believe that the fact that Bill Maher said some incendiary, misogynistic things means that what Rush said was OK? Truly? Do we really think that mean things said about President Bush in 2007 justify saying mean things about President Obama in 2012? Truly?

I just don’t think so. Maybe I’m naive.

The fact is, if I say hateful things (like my gas bag comments about Rush earlier in this rant), they’re hateful things. It just doesn’t matter what anyone else said before – my own bad behavior is my own bad behavior.

So – if you feel a need to defend Rush, consider taking a couple of aspirin. If you still feel the need, maybe move from that magical thinking camp into the First Amendment camp – you’d at least have something close to reality as a foundation for your argument.

We know when something is wrong. We don’t have to compare it to something else – and we don’t have to rely on magical thinking to justify it.

Oh, and “I know you are, but what am I???”

It’s that time again.

Time to take a short break from the end of the year hysterics that plague us all — last minute shopping, psyching ourselves up for those visiting family members, continuing to fight (or laugh at) an imaginary War on Christmas — to look back over 2011.

After living through it, I sincerely believe that future historians will look back at this year and declare definitively: “2011 was, in fact, a year.”

Among other things, 2011 was a year of ushering out the old, and replacing it with the new. We finally got rid of Pants On The Ground, but we exchanged it for Rebecca Black’s anthem to Mensa members everywhere, Friday. We thought no one would notice if we replaced Charlie Sheen with Aston Kutcher. And we ‘downsized’ Nancy Pelosi, and brought in John Boehner.

It’s important to note that I said new here, and not better.

There are some who believe that those who don’t understand history are doomed to repeat it. Just in case that’s true, let’s get to it – so we don’t have to do this again!

I’m not really a fan of tradition, or of doing things because “that’s how it’s always been done,” but in this case, I’ll make an exception. We’ll start the year in…

JANUARY

As is our habit, we spent some of our time and energy in January looking back in time. Wikipedia celebrated being in business for ten years, but you might not want to quote that in your essay – just in case. President Obama was finally able to sign the bill that covered the medical costs of heroic 9/11 first responders. The US eased travel and other restrictions on Cuba (the country, not Gooding Jr.). And climate records officially showed that 2000-2010 was the warmest decade ever recorded.

The economy continued to be a big story in January. The official count revealed that US banks foreclosed on over 1 million mortgages in 2010. Goldman Sachs noted that their profit fell by 38%, so naturally they rewarded their CEO by more than tripling his salary – from $600,000 to $2 million. I mean, what would you do?? And surprisingly, despite the existence of both Rush Limbaugh and Donald Trump, China passed the US as the world’s largest generator of wind power.

January brought with it some significant tragedies. In Tuscon, US Rep Gabrielle Giffords and 19 others were shot by a twisted wackjob. Ugandan human rights activist David Kato was brutally murdered. Scientists investigated the sudden deaths of tens of thousands of birds across the US. And since we talked a lot about earthquakes in 2010 , for 2011 we’ll concentrate on flooding – in January, major floods hit Brazil, Sri Lanka, South Africa, Saudi Arabia, and Australia.

Sargent Shriver went to watch Jack LaLanne do pushups in the Streets of Gold’s Gym.

There were other important events as well. The Arab Spring revolution began to change the world, starting in Tunisia, Egypt, Lebanon, and Yemen. Lance Armstrong cemented his icon status when he finally retired his wheels. MSNBC booted Keith Olbermann – which, depending on what side of the bed you get out of, was positive just because it happened, or because it helped expand the media universe beyond its previous confines. Great Britain showed that they’re still smarter than us by denying entry to Terry Jones, the Qu’ran-burning vegetable from Florida. And, in a world-reshaping referendum, more than 99% of voters elected to make Southern Sudan a sovereign nation independent of Sudan.

It seemed the year was on a roll – and January, as is so often the case, moved aside for…

FEBRUARY

The rains kept coming – the floods continued in Australia and Sri Lanka, and they hit Iran as well.

And floods weren’t the only natural disasters of February. A powerful blizzard blasted through the US midwest, and a major earthquake smacked New Zealand.

There were other types of disasters as well… The Cleveland Cavaliers set a new record for consecutive losses in a single NBA season. Blizzard announced that it was killing Guitar Hero. IBM’s contribution to SkyNet, Watson, whomped Brad Rutter and Ken Jennings on Jeopardy! And we bid adieu to Jane Russell, the 20th century’s answer to Helen of Troy.

In international news, the world continued to be in flux. Syria, Algeria, Iran, Bahrain, Libya, Djibouti, Jordan, Iraq, Morocco, Croatia, and Oman joined the Arab Spring. And because of these protests, change happened. The ruling party of Tunisia was officially dissolved, and – thanks to more than 2 million people demonstrating in Tahrir Square – Hosni Mubarak resigned as president of Egypt.

On the other side of the world, as immigration into the US fell off, immigration into Canada hit a record high. Maybe they should think about a fence, eh?

In the well, duh! department, the official inquiry into BPs oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico found that the catastrophe was entirely (that’s 100%, for those in the cheap seats) preventable.

And in the opposite of the well, duh! department, General Motors announced that it would pay its US hourly workers more than $4,000 each as a share of its profits – instead of giving all of it to its CEO. I have to say, that helped me feel better about buying a GM…

Oh, and apparently there was some Roman-Numeral-oriented football game in which the Packers beat the Steelers 31-25. But more importantly, during that game, we all saw the greatest commercial of all time (yes, I mean the one with the kid in the Darth Vader costume! If you don’t think that’s the greatest commercial ever, you can write your own Year In Review!!).

If you do write one, I can only assume that your Year In Review would have February followed by…

MARCH

This third month of the year was a time of significant transition. Phil Collins announced his retirement from music. Charlie Sheen started “winning”, and partied hard enough to kill two and a half men. The 14th Dalai Lama formally resigned as Tibet’s political leader. The New York Times announced it would start charging folks to read the same news on their website that they read for free on every other website. The world switched from the iPad to the iPad 2. Beyonce started growing a new Destiny’s Child. And the state of Illinois killed their death penalty.

There was also some unusual news stories in March. Surgeons in Boston performed the first full face transplant – and inexplicably, they weren’t sued by Joan Rivers. Pope Benedict XVI, prompt as ever, absolved the Jewish people for any responsibility for the death of Jesus. A 2500 year-old preserved human brain from the Iron Age was found near York in England, and in a related statement, Rush Limbaugh said, “So that’s where I left it!.”

In the latest episode of the popular game show “Let’s Fear and Hate What We Don’t Understand”, the evangelical world went nuts about a book they refused to read. The book, Love Wins, by Rob Bell, naturally went on to become a best seller… good job, fearmongers!

Flooding continued to play “didgeridoo in the billabong” in Australia, with Tasmania joining in this time. And Geraldine Ferraro joined Elizabeth Taylor in curtseying to the real Cleopatra.

The biggest story in March – and certainly one of the biggest of the entire year – was the 9.0 earthquake and subsequent aftershocks and tsunamis that rocked Japan, and, more specifically, the Fukushima nuclear power plant. This major event continues to have an impact, and is only now finally starting to be controlled. I find myself kinda hoping for Godzilla…

And my favorite story of the month – five Somali pirates who attacked the US Navy Frigate USS Nicholas are sentenced to life plus 80 years for being so unbelievably stupid that they attacked a US Navy Flippin’ Frigate! Best part? That happened in March, so it wasn’t even the kind of joke that is normally associated with…

APRIL

There were some stories that you’d think would have been April Fool’s jokes – but unfortunately, they weren’t. Kobe Bryant was caught on camera referring to a referee as a “Santorum.” (Editor’s note – this name was substituted for the actual offensive term used by Kobe.) The US Department of Justice defended its invasion of Wikileaks-related Twitter accounts, saying that any concerns about privacy or the First Amendment were “absurd.” The French banned the burqa and niqab. Sony’s PlayStation Network went offline after a worldwide security breach leaked the personal information of more than 77 million users. And President Obama released his long form birth certificate in the futile hopes that it would prove something to certain people for whom proof is only a term that reflects alcohol content.

Disasters didn’t take the month off… China, Indonesia, Philippines, Canada, the southern US, Columbia, and Brazil (again!) felt the wrath of major flooding. A sandstorm on the German autobahn led to a massive 80-plus car pile up. The US Congress made a hilariously bad temporary deal on the budget one hour before the deadline, avoiding a government shutdown. And, proving once again that it is bigger than everyone else, Texas suffered from wildfires that were larger and more destructive that those in surrounding states.

There was one disaster that no one seemed to think was a disaster… Atlas Shrugged – the Movie opened, exposing maybe four more people to some of the most hilarious fiction since Left Behind.

And then there were the events that were treated like disasters, but really weren’t … Pia Toscano was voted off American Idol. It was either the worst thing ever to happen in the history of television, or it wasn’t…depending on which side of the bed you got up on… And J Crew showed the world that wearing pink nail polish doesn’t make you gay any more than eating salmon makes you a grizzly bear.

In the category of “News That is Probably Only Interesting to Me”, researchers in Japan and Australia successfully teleported wave packets of light in a Schrodinger’s cat experiment; and UK Prime Minister David Cameron admitted to students in Pakistan that the British Empire of the past is to blame for a significant number of the world’s problems.

Speaking of the UK, in the category of “News That Apparently Mattered to Everyone BUT Me”, Prince Willie & Miss Cate got hitched in Westminster Abbey, surrounded by some of the most hilarious hats ever seen by mortal man.

As the old proverb goes, April showers bring…

MAY

…floods, which battered the midwest as the Mississippi River got too big for its bridges (ha!). But floods weren’t the only sign of Mama Nature’s crankiness – tornadoes rocked the central US, including a particularly nasty one that ravaged Joplin, MO.

Many of the largest stories in May had to do with elements of the media. Fox cancelled America’s Most Wanted after 23 years. The Oprah Winfrey Show ended after 25 years – and a new car!! Maria Shriver announced her separation from the Governator after 25 years of marriage. Scotty McCreery became the 10th American Idol. Macho Man Randy Savage slipped into an eternal Slim Jim. Duke Nukem Forever went gold (over 1/2 million sold) a full month before its release date. And speaking of release dates, Harold Camping was (here’s a shocker!!) wrong about the end of the world.

Trampling all over Jersey Shore and Real Housewives and Dance With Angry Celebrity Chefs, Models, and Kim Kardashian as the hottest, dumbest, and most ridiculous new reality TV show, the first episode of the Republican Presidential Debate and Gaffe Fest is held in South Carolina.

We learned that Osama bin Laden was killed by Navy Seals. And we learned that some doofuses were mad that his body wasn’t made available to them for whatever doofy rituals they wanted to perform. In their anger, some of these doofuses signed on to partake in the aforementioned reality TV show.

As May flowed into…

JUNE

…the floods kept coming in Canada and around the Mississippi River in the US.

Sheriff Matt Dillon and Columbo solved the eternal mystery, witnessed by Clarence Clemons and Jack Kevorkian.

Arab Spring moved into summer for Morocco, Syria, Yemen, Libya, Egypt, and Tunisia.

Led by ‘Crazy Man’ Mark Cuban and ‘Tall Man’ Dirk Nowitzki, the Dallas Mavericks beat the ‘LeBron’ Heat to win their first NBA title. Hundreds of thousands of bandwagoners fell right off the wagon when they found out that the NBA lock-out would gut the next basketball season.

The other major stories in June came from our own great Gotham herself, New York. First, rising star Anthony Weiner resigned from Congress as a direct result of sending pictures of his “Limbaugh” out via Twitter. (Editor’s note – this name was substituted for the actual offensive organ sent out by the ironically-named Congressman.)

And secondly, the state of New York legalized same sex marriage. This move was widely considered to be a sign of “the end of civilization as we know it”… either because they did it, or because they took so long to do it – depending on which side of the bed you get up on.

Showing that some things in the world were still normal, June led right into…

JULY

July was a month of endings… Atlantis fulfilled the final mission of the US Space Shuttle program. Casey Anthony’s murder trial ended with her acquittal. The last Borders Book Store closed its doors. Amidst a huge phone hacking scandal, Darth Murdoch’s News of the World published its final edition. The final Harry Potter flick broke box office records with more than $92 million on its opening day. That’s a lot of ‘Every Flavour Jelly Beans!’ J Lo & Marc Anthony split. And Dan Peek strummed along as Amy Winehouse and Betty Ford sang about rehab…

July also had some beginnings… the hotly (ha!) anticipated heat wave of 2011 began. The next contender to fail to defeat Facebook, Google +, debuted. And South Sudan officially began its life as a sovereign nation, and was recognized and voted into the UN.

July wasn’t exempt from its share of tragedies. Flooding swamped Denver, South Korea, and the Philippines. And in one of the worst stories ever, right-wing nut job Anders Breivik took it upon himself to kill a bunch of kids in Norway. Although I’m not normally a supporter of the death penalty, I found myself sad that he wasn’t caught in Texas…

Do you know why ‘G’ is the hottest letter in the alphabet? Because it’s in the middle of…

AUGUST

…which didn’t disappoint in the world of nature. Temperatures continued to soar to record heights in the northern hemisphere, and floods kept on keeping on in Malaysia, China, both Koreas, India, Nigeria, Belgium, Vermont, and New Jersey.

And partly due to the heat, wildfires continued to rage across Texas, Oklahoma, New Mexico, and Colorado. At about this point, Rick Perry began wondering at the wisdom of cutting the budget to central Texas fire departments…

Speaking of raging, the US government finally got the debt ceiling raised, avoiding a full-on shutdown. Not surprisingly, their actions created a Hulk-like monster destined to trample across the country in a Godzilla-esque frenzy, leaving a trail of destruction in its wake… But more about this Supercommittee later…

Bubba Smith joined Nick Ashford in a heavenly Motown duet.

In media news, Netflix chose August to start its slow implosion, starting the ball rolling with an inexplicable price increase. Or are they smarter than we think? We’ll see! And after Michele “Crazy Eyes” Bachmann won the Ames Straw Poll, the world’s worst rapper, T-Paw, dropped out of the world’s worst realty TV show.

August may have ended, but that didn’t mean things were ready to cool down in…

SEPTEMBER

In the back-to-school month, there were some major developments in the world of politics. Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell was finally abolished, Herman “Pizza Man” Cain won the Florida straw poll, Mitt “the Muppet” Romney won the Michigan straw poll, and women were finally allowed to vote in Saudi Arabia.

Tragedies in the world of nature continued to make headlines. The Philippines, China, Pakistan, India, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, DC, and New York were all hit by flooding. And an outbreak of listeria started in some cantaloupes from Colorado.

We learned that REM was breaking up, no doubt causing some to lose their religion…

And in a story that would come to dominate the news throughout the fall, the Occupy Wall Street movement began in New York City, causing a LOT of people to lose their minds as they chose to ignore the message of the protest while claiming to try to understand the message of the protest.

As fall officially rolled in, so did the month of…

OCTOBER

The change in season didn’t mean that the floods let up… this time they attacked Cambodia, Thailand, Ireland, and England.

Sports made it back into the news in October… Rich folks who want to be richer decided that there shouldn’t be any NBA basketball for awhile. In a baseball event called the ‘World’ Series, but that actually isn’t, the Cardinals beat the Rangers… and in a rugby event called the ‘World’ Cup, that actually is, New Zealand beat France. And in “why is this news” news, people decided to stop ‘planking’ and start ‘Tebowing’.

The good and the bad of marriage showed up in October: Sir Paul McCartney married Nancy Shevell, and Kim Kardashian divorced Kris Humphries after something like 20 minutes.

There were some developments with huge statistical impact. The human population of the world hit 7 billion. ICE reported that more than 400,000 illegal immigrants had been deported by the end of September, 2011, the most in US history – and there was still more than a quarter of the year left. This fact was completely missed by Tea Party supporters everywhere, naturally. The Occupy Movement expanded its reach – not only did it span across the US, it took hold overseas, sprouting up in Toronto, London, Madrid, Berlin, Rome, Bucharest, Tokyo, Taipei, and Sydney – all without any help from Joe the Plumber. And in Libya, reports were confirmed that Colonel Qaddafi was killed – probably the best-publicized result of the Arab Spring.

Steve Jobs went to show St. Peter his latest app…

In tech news, Microsoft bought Skype, and despite Apple’s release of the iPhone 4S, it lost its #1 smartphone maker ranking to Samsung. Don’t worry – when Siri becomes the voice of SkyNet, Samsung will pay!

And in another piece of the “News That Mikey Likes” category, Sarah Palin stated that she wouldn’t be running for president in 2012. Or will she?? (cue the ominous music)

And if all this wasn’t enough, even more stuff happened in…

NOVEMBER

The hits kept coming around the world as floods mangled Columbia, Italy, and reached the center of the city of Bangkok.

The world of politics didn’t lose a step in the fall. After years of scandal after scandal, Silvio Berlusconi finally resigned as Prime Minister of Italy. A whack job from Idaho took a couple of shots at the White House because he thought God told him to. Rick Perry reminded the world that he’s a rocket scientist, a tireless champion for the death penalty, and… I don’t remember the 3rd thing. Oops.

And in news that not nearly enough people think is important, new census data showed that 1 out of every 2 people in the US are classified as low-income, and nearly 50 million Americans live below the poverty line.

There were some other criminal stories in November, as well. Dr. Conrad Murray was sentenced to 4 years for the involuntary manslaughter of Michael Jackson. Penn State fired president Graham Spanier and football legend Joe Paterno for their roles in covering up sexual abuse allegedly committed by assistant coach Jerry Sandusky. And the LA County Sheriff’s office reopened its investigation into the death of Natalie Wood.

In other news that I don’t think is related, but maybe you do, the world got to see another 11/11/11; Regis Philbin left his show after 2,497 years; Demi filed for divorce from Ashton; American Airlines filed for Chapter 11; the Roman Catholic Church updated the official English translation of the Mass; the Roots didn’t play Billy Joel’s You May Be Right, I May Be Crazy for Michele Bachmann’s entrance on Jimmy Fallon’s show; and Pentatonix won the Sing-Off.

Joe Frazier, Anne McCaffrey, Bill Keane, and Heavy D went along to watch Andy Rooney complain about how bright it is in heaven.

Quickly becoming a meme thanks to very candid photos and video, the world saw serious incidents of excessive police brutality pop up at Occupy sites all over the country, with evidence appearing that at least some are the result of coordinated efforts. And sadly, to my knowledge, no one has taken up Megyn Kelly on her offer to spike her salad with pepper spray.

Remember that monstrous supercommittee I promised to get back to? No one was really surprised, but they failed to reach an agreement, choosing instead to fiddle while markets burned.

Unlike most of America, which seems to want its Christmas well before Thanksgiving, we’ve waited until after November was over before we went to…

DECEMBER

With strength that belied the fact that it was slowing down in general, major flooding hit the UK, and a disastrous flood tore up the Philippines. What wasn’t slowing down was the protesting that continued to roil wherever corruption showed its ugly little head. This time, along with the continuing Arab Spring (and Summer and Fall and Winter) and the Occupy Movement, angry protesters demonstrated in Russia to voice their displeasure with the election fraud allegedly perpetrated by Putin’s United Russia Party, and more protesters marched in China to voice their displeasure with the fact that… well… they’re ruled by the government of China.

Iran captured a US drone, and – here’s a surprise! – decided not to return it when President Obama asked them nicely. On the other hand, after WAY too much time, the US war in Iraq officially came to an end.

One of the only men who was ever able to be the president of two countries (Czechoslovakia and the Czech Republic), Vaclav Havel, passed on. And in International Irony News, North Korean baddie Kim Jong Il traveled by train because he was afraid to fly… and then he died on a train …

While world politics were a bit bleak, US politics continued to entertain… Herman “Munster” Cain suspended his presidential campaign due to the fallout from his alleged sexual misconduct, Rod “Rod” Blagojevich was sentenced to 14 years for getting caught, and Spanky “the Donald” Trump fired himself from his own presidential debate once he saw that no one was coming.

Of course, not all of the news from the US political front was entertaining. President Obama signed into law the beginning of the end of the Fifth Amendment. The US Congress continued to debate whether its better to add a tiny percentage of taxes to a tiny percentage of people to bring in trillions of dollars, or to add a larger percentage of taxes to a much larger percentage of people to bring in a few billion dollars. Again it seems that eight fifths of our country suffer from math illiteracy. And lawmakers continued to work toward passing a law that will change the Internet forever, despite strong protests from every single Internet authority.

In entertainment news, Robert Griffin III of Baylor won the Heisman, and Tiger Woods won his first major tournament in two years. Those rich folks from earlier decided to go ahead and have a wee bit of NBA after all. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 became the fastest-selling entertainment product of all time – passing $1 billion in sales in just 16 days. And the trailer to The Hobbit started teasing geeks of all ages.

And more random news… Saab filed for bankruptcy, and astronomers found an earth-sized planet orbiting a star that’s only 950 light-years from Earth… bit of a long commute there.

Harry Morgan and Christopher Hitchens joined Dobie Gray as he drifted away one last time…

And for the second time, Time Magazine named me as Person of the Year. It’s just nice to be nominated…

As has been the case in the past, I typically end these things before the year actually ends – so there’s always the chance that something major will happen, and I won’t have made fun of it. It’s a harsh reality, but I think you’ll survive.

This year’s been a wild ride. Regimes changed. An entire new country was born. The McRib came back for awhile. Justin Bieber finally got a new haircut. But it’s about over.

Of course, given the pattern we’ve established over the last few thousand years, next year will be an even wilder ride than this one has been!

Happy New Year!!

Tis the season… it’s the most wonderful time of the year… oh the weather outside is frightful… it’s beginning to look a lot like… (cue the dramatic ominous music)… THE WAR ON CHRISTMAS!!!

Is there anything more ridiculous?

Our country has seen a lot of war. Real honest-to-goodness wars against real enemies who want to do real harm – wars that cost real lives, and spend real money, and inspire real protests.

But at the end of every year, real people spend real time and real energy protesting a war that isn’t real.

I will say this as clearly as I can:

When I say “Happy Holidays” I am NOT trying to destroy your way of life.

Some of you may not know me – so for the record, I am a Christian. I celebrate Christmas. I love Christmas. I recognize that Jesus wasn’t born in December, and I don’t care – I’m just glad he was born, and the fact that we celebrate his birth during my favorite season (winter!!) is just a bonus.

I am a Christian, but I understand grammar. You see, I’ve looked at a calendar before, so I know that there is more than one holiday in December. There are other religious holidays – along with Christmas, there’s Ashura and Hanukkah and the Soltice. There are more modern made-up holidays – like Boxing Day and Kwanzaa and Festivus (for the rest of us!). And there are many more special days – some silly, some serious – that are celebrated in December, leading up to New Year’s Eve (another of my favorites!).

So when I say “Happy Holidays”, I’m not trying to yank your Jesus away – I’m just being accurate. Note the ‘s’ on the end of “Happy Holidays”. The plural denotes that there are multiple holidays in the season. Remember, there are two types of people in the world: those who are bad at math…

I am a Christian, but I am not a bully. I have friends who celebrate Christmas. But I also have friends who are Muslim, Jewish, Hindu, athiest, and a couple of wiccans and neo-pagans. They know I’m Christian. They don’t sit around waiting to pounce on me if I don’t mention Christmas in every conversation. “Ooooh, Mikey said ‘Happy Holidays’ – c’mon, let’s go convert him!”

So, am I really going to freak out and write a letter and boycott a store or restaurant because an employee said “Happy Holidays” when I walked in, or put up a sign that says “Seasons Greetings”? Am I so weak in my faith that I insist that they respect MY faith above anyone else’s faith? Am I so insecure in my beliefs that I require preferential treatment in order to feel good about myself?

Most religious traditions have some version of the Golden Rule, but Christianity is the source of the commonly quoted “official” version of it. It seems to me that we should act as though we believe it. If I want others to take me and my beliefs seriously – or at least respectfully – then shouldn’t I do the same?

“Seasons Greetings” and “Happy Holidays” aren’t an intentional affront to your sensibilities. They aren’t a subtle attack by a vast left-wing cabal working behind the scenes to undermine the basic tenets of your worldview.

I know this because I rarely miss a cabal meeting.

They’re simply a recognition that Christians aren’t alone in the world. And if that is enough to undermine the basic tenets of your worldview, maybe there are larger issues for us to discuss…

So – to those of you who participate, I’d like to say “Merry Christmas.” And to everyone, “Happy Holidays”… and may we all have a Happy New Year!

My wife and I had planned to go out this past weekend and see Breaking Dawn – the latest movie in the Twilight juggernaut – but she came down with a little bug (and I say little bug in the same way that I’d say that Mt. Kilimanjaro is a little hill.

She’s on the mend now, and we’ll reschedule our wee trip to the movies for another day. Still, the very fact that we’re planning to see the movie sparked some thoughts that I find interesting. I recognize that you might not find them interesting, but that’s a chance I’m willing to take.

Here’s the short version of what I’ve been thinking: it seems to me that our cultural idea of monsters has evolved – and I think that’s a positive sign.

That was the short version. If I’ve piqued your interest, I’ll wait a moment while you grab some coffee and settle in for the long version. … … … All set? Are ya comfy? Ok, let’s see where my meandering thought train takes us.

It seems that monsters have enjoyed a bit of a resurgence lately. Even if you aren’t a card-carrying member of Team Edward-or-Jacob, you may have noticed just how much monster-related stuff is out there: books, TV shows, movies, games, comics, toys, t-shirts, breakfast cereals, etc.

But the fact is, monsters have been a part of our cultural landscape for millenia. Ghosts and goblins, dragons and giants, sea monsters waiting for sailors to wander too far from land… monsters have been part of our literature since the beginning of… well, literature. Beowulf, the Odyssey and Iliad, Anubis, Quetzalcoatl … our earliest writings are replete with monsters.

And with good reason: monsters served as warnings. From the scary story told to children to keep them in line, to the epic horror that awaits the evildoer, monsters were effective tools for behavior modification.

As you might have guessed, the word monster has its roots in Latin… monstrum is something that is outside the natural order. And it shares a root with the verbs monstro and moneo (“show” and “warn”, respectively – think of the English word “demonstrate”). So classically, a monster is something unnatural that serves as a warning.

However, as you may have read recently – say, in the short version of this post – the concept of monster has been evolving.

Historically, monsters are evil. It’s their nature. It’s not something they choose, it’s who they are. On an cellular, existential level, monsters exist to torment the rest of us.

Why is that? Because we made them that way.

Deep in our cultural DNA is the idea of Other. Whether you think of it as a result of our pack mentality, or a product of tribalism, or a residue of religious purity, we have a powerful tendency to split people into “us” and “them”. It doesn’t really happen on a conscious level, but it’s everywhere – and the context varies with our circumstance. The “us” can be our family, fans of our favorite team, citizens of our country, adherents to our religious group… in each of these arenas, we subconsciously relegate people into the “them” category. As a result, we subconsciously (and sometimes even consciously) see these others as inferior in some way.

We justify this effortlessly. We call it in-group loyalty, or supporting our team, or patriotism, or faithfulness – which weakens those terms considerably. When we say that doing bad to “them” is equal to doing good for “us”, we are participating in one of humanity’s oldest pastimes: infrahumanization – a fancy word for the idea that our ingroup is somehow more human than any other group.

Infrahumanization is the root of many of our evils: genocide, racism & sexism (and many other isms), discrimination, bullying, class warfare, political stupidity… the list goes on. It’s not just saying “We’re number 1!” It’s actually believing that “we” are inherently better than “they” – and thinking (and acting) accordingly.

And here’s the rub: we have no control over most of the things that separate “us” from “them.”

Psychologist and experimental theologian Richard Beck calls it moral luck. Author Rachel Held Evans calls it the cosmic lottery. Some call it chance – others call it providence. However you look at it, we had no say in the major factors that make up most of the causes of “otherness”. We didn’t choose our parents or the gender of our birth. We didn’t choose our skin color or ethnic identities. We didn’t choose where we were born, or which religion was predominant in our geography, or how much money our family had when we came on the scene, or whether our parents were “good” people. We were born when and where and how and to whom we were born… and that was that.

From this concept, we developed the idea of monsters. Since there aren’t that many real differences between us, we needed to find ways to rationalize our demonization of the “others” – so we actually made demons of them. We made creatures who are inherently evil as a way of distinguishing “them” from “us”. Monsters are analogs of “others”. Think of it as a societal defense mechanism. We don’t need to feel guilty about hating “them” because they deserve our hatred – simply by virtue of their existance.

This idea went along smoothly… for centuries.

And then, gradually, changes started to appear in our societal landscape. The roots of this change go back to the Enlightenment, but the momentum for the change really picked up in the 1950s.

When WWII ended, there was an enormous cultural upheaval – and its echoes continue to reverberate. Rock and roll, the rise of the Civil Rights and anti-war movements, the Summer of Love and the Sexual Revolution, Watergate and the resultant changes in our view of government, the boom and bust bubbles of our economy, environmental consciousness, the Information Age, globalization… on and on and on. So many epic changes in such a relatively short period of time – these changes impacted virtually every aspect of our society.

Our view of monsters wasn’t exempt from these changes. Previously monsters were objects of fear and loathing simply because they existed. Suddenly, that’s not the case. Monsters were still to be feared, but they also deserved to be understood.

Look at King Kong… sure, we had to kill him. But on a very real level, it was our fault. We went to his island and kidnapped him. We brought him to our land to be humiliated and tortured. He was just being him. Consider Godzilla… sure, we needed to bring out the big guns to protect our cities from him, but it was our fault that he existed at all. He wouldn’t have been a problem if we hadn’t been messing with nuclear forces that we didn’t understand.

Then we move forward into our time… our monsters wouldn’t even be recognizeable to folks from previous eras. Trace the chain from Lon Chaney’s Wolf Man to Michael J. Fox’s Teen Wolf to Taylor Lautner’s Jacob. Follow the line from Bela Lugosi’s Dracula to David Boreanaz’s Angel to Robert Pattinson’s Edward. Couldn’t be much more different…

We’ve even changed the origins of these monsters. In the past, monsters were cursed, or the result of some malevolent occult practice, or the product of some twisted black magic. Now, it’s biology. Werewolves and vampires aren’t cursed – they simply have a disease that’s trasmitted by a bite… like rabies or malaria. Zombies aren’t summoned by some evil necromantic ritual – they’re the result of a plague, or chemical warfare.

So they aren’t cursed. They aren’t inherently monstrous at their core. It’s no longer who they are that’s evil… it’s what they do. And this is a HUGE difference. It means that, like us, they can choose to be bad… or they can choose to be good.

As a result of this conceptual evolution, it’s no longer a “good” thing to hate monsters simply because they exist. Now we’re forced to judge them by what they do – or don’t do.

This is a very good thing.

Remember, monsters are analogs for “others”. In the past, it was acceptable (or at least understandable) behavior to hate “others” simply for their “otherness”. Infrahumanization was commonplace. Even the US Constitution codified just how much less human a slave was than a free person. And it continues. Consider the treatment of minorities, women, immigrants, the disabled, the mentally ill, the homeless, the LGBT community, Muslims, either the Tea Party or the Occupy folks (depending on which side you’re on), etc. etc. etc. We are still woefully ignorant and stupid in the way we treat “others.”

But there has been progress. There are growing pockets of people who are choosing to see “others” differently, who are trying to put a stop to infrahumanization. We’re starting to see reactions to some of the hatred that comes from religious fundamentalism (on both sides of the Atlantic). We’re starting to see attempts to lessen the vitriolic rhetoric on both sides of our political landscape. We’re starting to see calls to lower the volume of the childish shrieking coming from talk radio and cable “news” pundits. We’re starting to see “other” people as people.

We aren’t done, by any stretch of the imagination. Society’s narrative is informed by our monster stories, but there is a time lag there. And there is still significant resistance. Look at our national conversation about bullying. We have some people who are putting some serious effort into the noble goal of eradicating bullying – or at least working to protect our children from it. But we also have people who are working just as hard to preserve their heritage of bullying by appealing to religious freedom or free speech.

I don’t think we’ll ever get rid of irrational hatred altogether – we’re still human. But a quick look at American history shows that these kinds of changes are possible. In general, America has changed for the good. For the most part, we don’t burn witches. Slavery is mostly gone. Women can vote. Institutionalized workplace discrimination is increasingly illegal. Certainly other parts of the world are behind in many of these areas, and we still have a long way to go, but progress has been made.

That gives me hope.

And there we are. Lots of thoughts (that I, at least, find interesting!) that were sparked by the fact that my wife and I at some point are going to feed even more money to the Twilight beast. If you made it to the end of this essay, I don’t know whether to offer you my congratulations, apologies, or thanks… I suppose some mix of all three would be appropriate.

I do hope, either way, that it made you think a little about who fills the role of “other” in your life – and whether they deserve to be in that role. And maybe stock up on garlic… just in case!

For those who have lost their brains at some point – perhaps because you forgot to plug it in, or you weren’t getting a good signal, or you left it in your other purse (or are you one of those folks who are still trying to pretend that your brain hasn’t been replaced by your mobile phone???) – yesterday was Easter.

For a huge chunk of the world’s populace, that day is important… either because you agree with the beliefs associated with the day, or because you disagree and want to make a point, or because you’re completely confused and have mixed up Easter with any of a variety of other holidays:

“Easter’s that day when we wear bonnets and multicolored ties to commemorate when Jesus came out of the tomb and saw his shadow, which meant that we’d have six more weeks of ham, stale chocolate bunnies, and lots of egg salad, right?”

For me, it was an important day for another reason as well – it marked the end of Lent. And this year, Lent was much more significant to me than it was in the past. You see, rather than giving up something small, like Diet Coke or chocolate or the musical stylings of Lady Gaga, I chose to make a real, personal sacrifice.

I gave up getting into social/religious/political debates online.

It seemed like a good plan at the time. Even when I first thought of it, I recoiled from the idea like my wife recoils from spiders. It sounded hard – and that fact added to its appeal. If my sacrifice was truly painful for me, then maybe I’d get out of Lent what I’m supposed to… that was the idea.

I had no idea how hard it was actually going to be.

Do you realize how much has happened in the world in the last 40 days??? OH MY WORD!!!

Now that Lent is over, what have I learned? Was this time worthwhile? I think it was. I learned that I’m a little too argumentative. I realized that I don’t have enough empathy when I’m discussing the world with folks. I re-learned that some people have linked their opinions very closely with their self-esteem, and that I should tread a little more gently. And I remembered that while every opinion is not valid or true or logical or even sane, people are allowed to have them.

Hopefully this will lead to a kinder, gentler online presence for Mikey.

But, for right now, I have 40 days of stuff saved up. I have 40 days worth of rants that are threatening to blow my spleen if I don’t release some of that pressure. I have 40 days of comments that have been eating away at my psyche, stripping it to the bone like a school of piranhas in a bad jungle movie, devouring a poor bit part character in order to show that the lead actor’s predicament is indeed dire.

So, as you might imagine, this rant is more for my benefit than yours… if you don’t want to read it, that’s completely understandable. If, however, you, like the majority of Americans, are unable to drive by a traffic accident without twisting your neck like a sadistic owl in the hopes of seeing something more gruesome than your typical day at the office, go ahead and read it. I won’t judge.

A couple of notes: first, these are from the last 40 days, so they may seem a bit dated – and even cryptic if you haven’t kept up with some of the social/religious/political developments in the world. Secondly, they aren’t in any particular order – I wrote them down as I thought of them. Thirdly, if you find yourself disagreeing with me at some point during the course of this rant, I’m guessing that’s kinda the point…

Here it is – Mikey’s Post-Lent Social/Religious/Political Rampage:

1. Pia got voted off. Preteen girls don’t agree with you – and they’re the ones who vote.
2. Glenn Beck. Wow.
3. Maybe folks who are on their 3rd, 4th, or 5th wife shouldn’t preach about preserving the institution of marriage.
4. Why do we care more about the voices in Charlie Sheen’s head than the voices of our middle and lower classes?
5. Pink nail polish doesn’t make you gay any more than eating salmon makes you a grizzly bear.
6. A couple of words for The Donald: he was born in Hawaii, not Kenya… a vote for you as President is the same as asking Dr. Kevorkian to help with a sore throat… and the only reason that someone hasn’t trapped that horrifying warthog on the top of your head is that PETA doesn’t discriminate against ugly animals.
7. I am definitely NOT John Galt – praise the Lord!!
8. Read the book yourself. Don’t take the word of your favorite angry-churchlady-channeling pastor who also hasn’t read the book.
9. If you’re an actor, politician, or UCLA student, remember that the world can read your tweets, see your YouTube postings, and watch you on TV (even if it’s only CSpan!)!!
10. You can’t both preach the virtues of capitalism, AND complain that the NY Times is going to charge for access to its website without sounding like a bonehead.
11. That bonehead in Florida does, in fact, have the right to burn a Qu’ran. But that doesn’t mean he’s not a bonehead.
12. Really, Newt? We’re going to be a secular atheist society dominated by radical Islamists? You don’t see a problem with that statement?
13. Whatever you think of what he may or may not have done, Bradley Manning really does deserve fair treatment.
14. Kobe (and EVERYONE ELSE in the world), it doesn’t really matter what you meant by it… just don’t say that word. Ever.
15. It shouldn’t be surprising to anyone when a politician doesn’t know history – when the people who elected them don’t know history.
16. The “good old days” were only good for a select few people. For a LOT of people, they were really really bad days.
17. Be honest. If you are seriously interested in education reform, then do something to reform education. Don’t cite “education reform” if all you really want to do is break up a union in order to please your corporate donors. If you’re going to choose a few rich over a lot of poor, at least be honest about it.
18. Make sure you know everything about what it means to be a Christian before you go on about what it means to be a Muslim.
19. Math is real. Stop saying that you are doing the “will of the people” if less than 50% agree with you.
20. Math is real. There is a pretty big difference between less than 3%, and more than 90% – and this WAS intended to be a factual statement.
21. Math is real. Getting rid of the Bush tax cuts for the very very few would reduce the deficit more than the current proposal to cut benefits from the very very many. And have you ever noticed that the vast majority of folks who whine the loudest about keeping those cuts are never going to have enough money to benefit from them?
22. Dictionaries are our friends. “Regulation” and “Socialism” are NOT the same thing.
23. Read a book. No one is going to be able to impose Sharia law on you, even if they wanted to. So get over it, and let them build their church.
24. Just because I think bullying is wrong and should immediately be stopped doesn’t mean that I want to turn you gay.
25. Here’s a touchy one: laws against hate speech and abuse aren’t contrary to the 1st Amendment, and laws restricting the availability of ridiculously large ammo clips aren’t contrary to the 2nd Amendment.
26. I know I said it before, but it’s worth repeating. President Obama was born in Hawaii, not Kenya. If he’d been a white guy named Bob, but with all the other stuff being the same (a foreign student as a father, a mother born in Hawaii, an opinion that we should try to get along with Muslims, a liberal view toward taking care of the non-billionaires, etc.), would there be this ridiculous outcry?
27. The phrase is “I couldn’t care less.” Really. Look it up.
28. When did “educated” and “elitist” become interchangeable words?
29. The slippery slope argument is a logical fallacy. Really.
30. A person can be smart – but for the most part “people” are dumb. Here are three facts to support my hypothesis: 1) polls show that there are a lot of people who agree with Warthog Head’s birther fantasies, 2) another poll showed that a large chunk of the population of Mississippi thinks that interracial marriage should go back to being illegal, and 3) you know that deodorant commercial where Bear Grylls says that remarkable phrase “…and fear is like tasty gravy to a hungry wolf”? Well, in that commercial, after Bear says “put on the meat ponchos”, and we see those poor schmucks running away from a pack of Hollywood stunt wolves, the fine print at the bottom of the screen says Do Not Attempt…Check mate.
31. On one side of the scale, we have Adam Smith’s Invisible Hand. And on the other side of the scale, we have reasonable work hours, safer working conditions, restrictions on child labor, minimum wages, paid vacations, family medical leave, cleaner air and water, Social Security and Medicare, and some protections from discrimination in employment, housing, education, banking, and health care – none of which would have happened under the “invisible hand”. Not a tough choice.
32. This headline is an example of the hilarity that makes me think our entire educational system has completely failed our society: “Sean Hannity Doing Show On Media Bias.”
33. The statement “Christians shouldn’t be interested in social justice” makes as much sense as peanut butter and onion pudding with licorice and liver pilaf.
34. Biased modern historians’ interpretations versus the actual words of the actual people who actually decided to secede… there might be a reason that we’re still fighting the Civil War. Might be worth challenging assumptions and doing some research…
35. Undocumented workers who have jobs (ya know, the ones you think they stole from Americans??) DO pay taxes. Employers withhold from them just like they withhold from the rest of us – the difference: undocumented workers can’t file returns, so they don’t get a refund… Plus they pay sales tax for everything just like the rest of us. Complain about immigration if you feel like you must, but stop whining about taxes.
36. In the moments right before you realize that you are wrong, being wrong feels exactly the same as being right. Try to bear that in mind when you are certain of something.
37. When you doctor up a photo showing President Obama in a family of chimpanzees, just admit that you’re a racist. Don’t say “It’s ok because I have friends who are black.” It’s not.
38. Don’t say stupid things like “Glee” is “shoving the gay thing down our throats”… just change the channel to one that’s shoving the stupid thing down our throats. It’s America.
39. You maybe shouldn’t be surprised that I don’t like Rush Limbaugh when he has said that I am “savage”, “walking human debris”, and “worse than any Nazi secret police”…
40. Hey Facebook, would it really be so hard to come up with a button to push that would not only hide me from all of your existing games, but any new games that might come out in the future?

Whew. I’m glad to get that off my chest.

And now, back to your regularly scheduled surfing… Have a great day!!

On this date (March 14), we celebrate a serendipitous concurrence of events: it’s Pi Day, and it’s Albert Einstein’s 132nd birthday.

The day of the irrational number, and the hyper-rational theoretical physicist… what could be more perfect?

We have the constant whose value is the ratio of any Euclidean plane circle’s circumference to its diameter – and that has inspired such blonde-joke-quality humor as “Pi r squared? But everybody knows pie are round!”

And we have the man whose last name has become synonymous with genius, and who gave us such witty jewels as “You don’t truly understand something until you can explain it to your grandmother.”

A number that cannot be exactly represented in decimal form, and a scientist who understood more than almost anyone about the true nature of the universe, but who couldn’t grasp the concept of a comb…

Still, maybe Einstein is smart enough to tell me once and for all what the difference is between pie and cobbler… !

On this date, March the 2nd, in 1904,
Was born the Great Geisel, with nicknames galore.

His mom called him Theo when she poured his juice,
But most of us knew Theo as Dr. Seuss!

He spoke of blue fish, cats in hats; with no flinches,
Of dastardly kleptomaniacal Grinches.

Known best for his rhymes, and trisyllabic meters,
He helped make us all into much better readers.

In honor of pachyderms hearing a Who,
We say ‘happy birthday’ and green ham to you!

On this date (Feb 28), we mark the end of Black History Month. Since the late 1970s, Black History Month has been observed/celebrated annually in the US and Canada in February, and in the UK in October. This time of observance and education was started as Negro History Week back in 1926 by a man named Carter G. Woodson, with the explicit goal of educating the American people about the achievements and back stories of African Americans.

When he started it, his stated purpose was to make the history of African Americans a significant part of American history as a whole. In fact, he hoped that at some point Negro History Week would outlive its usefulness. And one could make an argument that to a small extent, his goal was realized – African American history is taught at all levels of education… it’s virtually impossible to find an American History textbook that doesn’t include at least some passages about black history – even those approved by the Texas board of education!

Like everything else that relates to history in this country, there’s no shortage of controversy surrounding Black History Month. For decades now there have been criticisms, critiques, and condemnations of BHM from all sides. Some of the arguments are exactly what you’d expect: complaints from folks who say something along the lines of “Why should they get a month? I don’t get a month!” It’s a comment vaguely reminiscent of children who ask “If there’s a Mother’s Day and a Father’s Day, why isn’t there a Kid’s Day?” And I think the answer is likely to be the same: “Every day is Kid’s Day.”

A few of the other critiques of BHM are a little better. Some have publicly wondered why it’s celebrated in the shortest month of the year. Some have said that the month gives us an excuse to ignore African American history completely for the other 11 months. There are those who wonder if the dedication of a single BHM leads people to believe that African American history is somehow separate from American history.

There are some arguments that are even more valid. In some circles, BHM has expanded from its original idea of promoting awareness of the history of African Americans to a broad push toward the promotion of pluralism and multiculturalism – leading some to wonder if the name should be changed to something more inclusive. Other critics rightly point out that BHM has been co-opted by the usual holiday demons of commercialism and marketing. And there are some complaints that BHM has morphed into a celebration of current African American celebrities, instead of an education about important historical African American figures.

Finally, there’s the realization that BHM has lost serious market share. BHM has been seriously diluted – February is also American Heart Month, International Boost Self-Esteem Month, International Embroidery Month, Library Lovers Month, National Cherry Month, National Children’s Dental Health Month, National Snack Food Month, National Bird-Feeding Month, and the ever-popular Return Shopping Carts to the Supermarket Month.

So maybe there’s some validity to the idea that BHM is due for some kind of change. However, it’s extremely difficult to give any credence to the idea that BHM was a bad idea. There’s no doubt that black history was a gap in the minds of most American historians during the time of Carter G. Woodson. And there’s no doubt that the observance of BHM has played an important role in continuing the conversation about race relations in the US.

In the interest of pursuing this conversation, I leave you with a final thought. Think about the phrase “…all men are created equal.” For some, this is a quintessential American concept – one of the bedrock, fundamental ideas upon which our entire society is built. Here’s a question that I’d like you to consider:

Equal in what way? Are all men created equal in opportunity? Clearly not. Equal in ability? No. Status or social position? Nope. Intelligence? Privilege? Resources? Talent? Health? Influence? Obviously we aren’t equal in any of these… so in what way are we created equal?

I submit that this equality refers to our inherent value as people. There is a theory that mental health hinges on our ability to view oneself as neither more nor less valuable than another. This means that racism, sexism, classism, and other forms of bigotry really are crazy!!

So, in closing, I hope that sometime during this month, you found a way to learn something about African American history that you didn’t know before… and I hope that, starting tomorrow, you have a great American Dietetic Association National Nutrition Month.