Fred: Thought Leader.

I got an invitation to a meeting about thought leadership. Of course they would want my ideas. 

Nah, JK, LOL, it was from LinkedIn. They don't care.

"The Value of Thought Leadership in Economic Uncertainty" is the topic, and I'm not saying it's a bad topic. The times are economically uncertain. And as I've written here before, I am convinced that true leadership is more talent than knowledge, but like any raw talent it A) needs honing and practice and B) hasn't alighted on many of the people who believe it has. It can be faked to some extent with intelligence and experience and learned skills, but there’s a reason we talk about “born leaders.”

Worse, though, is that few people devote a lot of thought to anything.

The buzz phrase "thought leadership" annoys me, anyway. According to LinkedIn, where they know these things, there's a big difference between thought leading and regular nonfat leading:

The difference between regular leaders and thought leaders is that thought leaders have a large following while their regular counterparts don't. Your followers help catalyze a movement that spreads your ideas from one person to the next.

So, a thought leader makes money whereas a leader leader just makes success. 

Or, a leader can direct people but a thought leader changes the way they think. Okay, I can dig it. I hate it, but I can dig it.

First of all, the American Revolution may have featured the last great thought leaders, putting the rights of the individual as sovereign. Since then a great many impactful "thought leaders" have sucked. Marx, Lenin, Mao, Hitler, Stalin, Xi, Pol Pot, Jim Jones, those French Revolution guys, all thought leaders, all the worst bastards to ever come out of the bastard machine. 

Second, one may wish to lead thoughts, but few people have either original thoughts or leadership skills. So how is one to be a thought leader in economic uncertainty? I would guess it boils down to the same old inspirational, motivational rah-rah in a barely new package: trouble = opportunity and all that. Sure. Maybe.

I wouldn't want to open a new restaurant at a time when people can barely buy groceries, although some people will find a way to make it work. But everyone knows deep down that if sticking to it and believing in yourself was all it took, this world would have 100 times more Hollywood stars and 1,000 times more billionaires. 

If I were LinkedIn, I'd be glad that Mr. Fred Key turned down this opportunity to share my thoughts on the topic. Like most people who consider themselves realists, whether we are or not, I have a strong cynical streak and an expectation of disaster. But, as the old man once observed, if you're a pessimist, at least you're guaranteed to be right eventually.

Well enough alone?

The mask in science fiction.

Fritz Leiber wrote a science fiction story called "Coming Attraction" that was published in the November 1950 issue of Galaxy. It is considered a classic. It's a lousy story. But it was an important one at the time.

Science fiction had been easing into the public consciousness for decades, and was generally associated with wonder, with the E. E. "Doc" Smith-type galactic visions of discovery and survival and ray guns and aliens and triumph. You even get a feel for that from the cover of the issue.

The reason I call "Coming Attraction" a lousy story is that it is all exposition, functioning like propaganda. "You think your future is going to be great? Ha! The atomic war with the Soviet Union continues, half of New York is uninhabitable, and everyone behaves like a total bastard! There's your future!" There's barely any plot; just a look at this mess, and this mess, and this horror here, which the ironic title of the story indicates we will get. You can read the story here, or a summary at its Wikipedia page.

The atomic bomb, one of the most shocking things man had ever devised, developed in secret, unleashed at once, was a traumatic event in culture, as we are reminded looking back at this story. It turned science fiction into the most depressing genre of them all, and it has never really cheered up. Maybe books about serial killers and other horrors are more depressing, but I never read that stuff in my youth. I read stories like this, and was convinced the world would be blown to smithereens before I was thirty. No wonder I drank.

Leiber was born in Chicago, but by making Turner, his hero in this story, a foreigner, and one from a country that in 1950 was still rebuilding from the horrors of World War II, he can spit on American culture and corruption while poking the reader in the ribs to say You think your cities will be safe in the next war?

Thank God Leiber's predictions did not come true. But one sort of seems true now. In the New York of his story, mask wearing is not only common, it is required, but not because of disease. Here's the section concerning masks, told by Turner:

"I suppose the masks give you some trouble," I observed. "Over in England we've been reading about your new crop of masked female bandits."
     "Those things get exaggerated," the first policeman assured me. "It's the men masking as women that really mix us up. But, brother, when we nab them, we jump on them with both feet."
     "And you get so you can spot women almost as well as if they had naked faces," the second policeman volunteered. "You know, hands and all that."
     "Especially all that," the first agreed with a chuckle. "Say, is it true that some girls don't mask over in England?"
     "A number of them have picked up the fashion," I told him. "Only a few, though—the ones who always adopt the latest style, however extreme."
     "They're usually masked in the British newscasts."
     "I imagine it's arranged that way out of deference to American taste," I confessed. "Actually, not very many do mask."
     The second policeman considered that. "Girls going down the street bare from the neck up." It was not clear whether he viewed the prospect with relish or moral distaste. Likely both.
     "A few members keep trying to persuade Parliament to enact a law forbidding all masking," I continued, talking perhaps a bit too much.
     The second policeman shook his head. "What an idea. You know, masks are a pretty good thing, brother. Couple of years more and I'm going to make my wife wear hers around the house."
     The first policeman shrugged. "If women were to stop wearing masks, in six weeks you wouldn't know the difference. You get used to anything, if enough people do or don't do it."
     I agreed, rather regretfully, and left them. I turned north on Broadway (old Tenth Avenue, I believe) and walked rapidly until I was beyond Inferno. Passing such an area of undecontaminated radioactivity always makes a person queasy. I thanked God there weren't any such in England, as yet.
     The street was almost empty, though I was accosted by a couple of beggars with faces tunneled by H-bomb scars, whether real or of makeup putty, I couldn't tell. A fat woman held out a baby with webbed fingers and toes. I told myself it would have been deformed anyway and that she was only capitalizing on our fear of bomb-induced mutations. Still, I gave her a seven-and-a-half-cent piece. Her mask made me feel I was paying tribute to an African fetish.
     "May all your children be blessed with one head and two eyes, sir."
     "Thanks," I said, shuddering, and hurried past her.
     "... There's only trash behind the mask, so turn your head, stick to your task: Stay away, stay away—from—the—girls!"
     This last was the end of an anti-sex song being sung by some religionists half a block from the circle-and-cross insignia of a femalist temple. They reminded me only faintly of our small tribe of British monastics. Above their heads was a jumble of billboards advertising predigested foods, wrestling instruction, radio handies and the like.
     I stared at the hysterical slogans with disagreeable fascination. Since the female face and form have been banned on American signs, the very letters of the advertiser's alphabet have begun to crawl with sex—the fat-bellied, big-breasted capital B, the lascivious double O. However, I reminded myself, it is chiefly the mask that so strangely accents sex in America.
     A British anthropologist has pointed out, that, while it took more than 5,000 years to shift the chief point of sexual interest from the hips to the breasts, the next transition to the face has taken less than 50 years. Comparing the American style with Moslem tradition is not valid; Moslem women are compelled to wear veils, the purpose of which is concealment, while American women have only the compulsion of fashion and use masks to create mystery.
     Theory aside, the actual origins of the trend are to be found in the anti-radiation clothing of World War III, which led to masked wrestling, now a fantastically popular sport, and that in turn led to the current female fashion. Only a wild style at first, masks quickly became as necessary as brassieres and lipsticks had been earlier in the century.

So this was the SF of 1950, the carefree postwar era of the American decade.

When I was a kid, Leiber was best known for his fantasy works, particularly the stories of Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser. I read a couple of them, and I didn't like them, either. I hate to pick on a guy who's been dead for almost thirty years, but I sure am glad not to be a character in any of his stories.

At least we can say that, however crappy things may be today, they aren't at all like he predicted in "Coming Attraction."

Fred's Book Club: I Think I Can!

Welcome to another Wednesday, and thus another episode of the Humpback Writers, so named for the day of the week and not any humps whatever. Let's kick things off with a song:

Now, Fred's an intellectual, brings a book to every meal
He likes the deep philosophers, like Norman Vincent Peale
He thinks the army's just the thing
Because he finds it broadening
It makes a fellow proud to be a soldier!

Of course Tom Lehrer was not referring to me as the Fred in his song "It Makes a Fellow Proud to Be a Soldier," but he does make a reference to one of the most popular writers of his time, Norman Vincent Peale, who wrote this little tome:

"This book is written to suggest techniques and to give examples which demonstrate that you do not need to be defeated by anything, that you can have peace of mind, improved health, and a never-ceasing flow of energy" writes Dr. Peale in the introduction. "In short, your life can be full of joy and satisfaction. Of this I have no doubt at all for I have watched countless persons learn and apply a system of simple procedures that has brought about the foregoing benefits in their lives."

Sounds like a massive promise, doesn't it? And indeed The Power of Positive Thinking had and continues to have a massive impact on modern culture in a number of ways I know. It was published in 1952, when America was in a new war having just gotten through the big one, and the world had been exposed to the staggering effects of evil ambition; yet this little seeming Pollyana of a book struck a chord with millions that reverberates to this day. It spoke to the aspirational soul of America, but its appeal reached beyond our national borders. The idea that one could change one's circumstances by changing one's mental condition was not new (Émile Coué had led the pack on that) but Peale tied it to our characteristic evangelism and made it much more than Emersonian self-reliance.

The book is mostly made up of anecdotes of biblical-based optimism and fervent, steady prayer leading to amazing results. This was not the way most of our European ancestors saw prayer -- beseeching a distant and dangerous God. This was a scripture-based plan to attune one's self to a loving and helping God; what could be more positive than that? Take the obstacle man:

He then reached into his pocket and took out his wallet. Under the isinglass window was a card on which were written some words. He shoved the wallet across the table and said, "There, son, read that. That is my formula, and don't give me the song and dance that it won't work either. I know better from experience."
     The obstacle man picked up the wallet and with a strange look on his face read the words to himself.
      "Read them out loud," urged the owner of the wallet.
     This is what he read in a slow, dubious voice, "I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me." (Philippians 4:13)
     The owner of the wallet put it back in his pocket and said, "I have lived a long time and have faced a lot of difficulties in my time, but there is power in those words -- actual power -- and with them you can remove any obstacle."

The rest of it is basic, practical, easy-to-understand instructions, as in this list at the end of the chapter "Try Prayer Power":

1. Set aside a few minutes every day. Do not say anything. Simply practice thinking about God. This will make your mind spiritually receptive.
2. Then pray orally, using simple, natural words. Tell God anything that is on your mind. Do not think you must use stereotyped pious phrases. Talk to God in your own language. He understands it.
3. Pray as you go about the business of the day, on the subway or bus or at your desk. Utilize minute prayers by closing your eyes to shut out the world and concentrating briefly on God's presence. The more you do this every day the nearer you will feel God's presence.

And so on, ten tips in all, gently leading the reader to a better prayer life.

You may wonder how a dazzling sophisticate like myself came to read a book with such homespun cheerfulness. Well, it was a particularly dark spot in my young manhood. I'd been dumped by four girlfriends in a row; I had a crap nowheresville job taken from hunger after a long layoff; my dad was very sick; everything looked bleak. I'd certainly heard of the book; everyone had for fifty years after its introduction. The chapter titles really appealed to me -- "I Don't Believe in Defeat" (I did); "How to Break the Worry Habit" (I had it); "The Power to Solve Personal Problems" (I had those in spades). When I found out I was working near the church where Peale had been senior minister for 52 years (the lovely Marble Collegiate Church on Fifth Avenue at 29th), it seemed like fate. Even the story of how Peale got that position seemed to back up his thesis -- one day in 1932 he had to fill in for another preacher unexpectedly, and he held the job until 1984. He lived to a ripe old age of 95. (Incidentally, Donald Trump attended Marble Collegiate growing up, and married Ivana there, for what that's worth.)

Peale's great message was turning prayer into a hard tool people could use to transform their lives. Although explicitly Christian, this had some similarity to  Pragmatism, the "whatever works" religious school of William James and Charles Peirce. Alcoholics Anonymous had adopted it as a means of using a spiritual basis for recovery in the 1930s. Whether Peale knew anything about this or not, there was a practicality for people in distress that he shared with average readers to improve their lot.

I had some stumbling blocks when I read the book, and I still do, and they're not all the same. Take for example his story of the salesman;

"I'm a traveling salesman," he explained, "and I drive around all day calling on my customers, I have discovered that while a man drives he thinks all kinds of thoughts. If his pattern of thought is negative, he will think many negative thoughts during the day and that, of course, is bad for him; but that is the way I used to be. I used to drive around between calls thinking fear and defeat thoughts, and incidentally that is one reason my sales were down. But since I have been using these cards [scriptural cards with Matthew 17:20 and Romans 8:31] as I drive and committing the words to memory, I have learned to think differently. The old insecurities that used to haunt me are just about all gone, and instead of thinking fear thoughts of defeat and ineffectiveness, I think thoughts of faith and courage. It is really wonderful the way this method has changed me. It has helped my business, too, for how can one expect to make a sale if he drives up to a customer's place of business thinking he is not going to make a sale?" 

It's hard to argue with that. But what if this man was a salesman for a company that made cheap crap that broke after the first use? Or useless snake oil? Or Chinese medical supplies? Ought he to expect divine help for selling this garbage, no matter how virtuous he may be?

Also, I have to think that Peale's legacy includes the so-called Prosperity Gospel movement, which seems to me like a complete reversal of the actual Gospels' love and humility, even a shameful and childish worship of wealth disguised as altruism. What happens when followers fail to achieve prosperity, as some must? Goodness knows there are plenty of people around who are deluded about their own talents. Will they blame God, become atheists, fall into despair? Does belief that God will help you become healthy and rich if you pray enough set believers up for a catastrophic failure of faith? I suspect so.

As I've noted elsewhere, "when bad things happen to good people" is not just a ponderous question in life; for Catholics, it's kind of our mission statement. But Peale never meant that Divine Worship was a money machine that would drop sacks of cash into the laps of believers. He simply meant that people who expect to fail will, and these people can be helped by a higher power that can change their attitudes. He made a brilliant career of it and probably helped a lot of people.

Maybe I'm still just too pessimistic. I will say that the book was only of limited help when I read it first, mainly because I had no faith in anything. It was like trying to build a table without tools. My life did get better, as it often does, and at least reading this gave me some hope for that dark period.

You know, I wanted to run this book today because I thought it would help us get cheered up in a time of trouble. Actually, I think I feel a little better now.

Janu-wary.

I shouldn't complain about the weather, what with wildfires in Australia and mudslides in Brazil. But this is me we're talking about. Of course I will!

This is the mildest January I can remember, and I'm expecting the worst.

The conditions this month -- rain, a little snow. We've seen snow fronts schlep down here from Canada and the Great Plains and turn into cold rain somewhere over Pennsylvania or something. It's been quiet.

Too quiet.

I'm afraid that February is coming for us, whipping up a bomb cyclone of snow.

December, when it was still autumn, was considerably colder and snowier than January. I had to break out the HotHands one day when it was windy and we barely got over 20. My dogs seldom care how cold it is, but they're covered in double coats of hair. My scalp doesn't even have a single decent coat. Human beings invented central heating, not dogs. As tough as December was, though, January's been a bust.

Here's a typical scenario. We had been told last week that snow was going pay us a visit on the weekend, just has it had the previous week (when we got not even three inches here, I think). On Friday night it rained a lot. By Saturday all that was left of the previous week's snow were strips where it had piled up along the edge of roads or driveways. It looked like bad piping on the first day of Kindergarten Pastry School.

Nevertheless, there was still some treachery. It rained a lot more Saturday, temperatures dipped overnight, and we had black ice on the driveway Sunday morning -- almost in time for a reenactment of the concussion saga that ruined my life for weeks last February. But the day was mild and that went away quickly.

This January has been awful for Senior Varsity dog Tralfaz, who loves snow more than Picabo Street does. Saturday night was particularly sad. He laid down on one of those crummy strips of snow, paws around it like he was hugging it, looking up at me in the darkness. He took a little desultory nibble of snow. If I'd had my phone I would have recorded it so you could cry too, it was so sad.

I wish I could explain to him where the snow went. Science eludes his grasp. Sunday morning he was inspecting a larger floe at the end of the block, wondering why a large volume of ice appears to melt slower than the smaller volume on our property under identical conditions. Mysteries of science!

Well, that's it for January -- dry all this week. Then we enter February, when the forecast is snow. Again. But even that is of the "rain and snow and 39 degrees" variety -- nothing like what Tralfaz needs. More, of course, than I want. As you can see, I lose whether it snows or not. So what else is new?

I now know why people move to Florida. Even the threat of alligators and falling lizards and hurricanes and Florida Man himself can't keep them out.

Hey, did you know there's a town in New York's Hudson Valley named Florida? It's true! I think it was a put-on for city suckers with a poor sense of direction. "Come retire to Florida! Put down a deposit and we'll even pay your moving expenses!" And then instead of a thousand miles south, they find themselves sixty miles north, with even more snow.

I know that feeling.

Trust.

I've been thinking a lot since the beginning of Easter -- Easter is still going, of course; it runs until Pentecost (this year on June 9) -- about trust. It has been an issue for me since I started to claw my way out of paganism and agnosticism many years ago.

Can one be a pagan and an agnostic? Well, I gave it my best shot.

The advantage of both paganism and atheism is this: that they answer the question "If God is good, why do bad things happen?" The pagan may be pantheistic (seeing bad things as the result of bad spirits or gods) and feel that bad things may be countered by getting power for oneself; the atheist simply says that God is not good because he does not exist. The Christian is the one who must square this circle, and it hardly needs to be said that I'm not the first one to run against this stumbling block. It doesn't help that I'm naturally pessimistic and that faith is like a second language to me.

The early Christians, and saints throughout the ages, did not find the bad things in life to be bad. They found the harshest persecutions to be nothing compared to the glory yet to come; they found lessons and endurance in the most difficult of life's circumstances. The average cradle Christian on the street may look at that and say, "I think I'll go see what the pagans and atheists have to offer instead."

When one is not blessed with an extraordinarily powerful faith, but does believe in a good and loving God, how does he fill the gap between the bad things that can happen and the belief in a merciful and loving God? God did not spare His own Son the Cross. How much more will He let happen to me? Doesn't he know how weak I am?

People would tell me to simply trust in God. Christian writers who informed my budding belief knew that trust in God was crucial. But how I could I trust God when he allows typhoons, earthquakes, birth defects, volcanoes, etc. etc. etc.?

A friend of mine told me that trusting in God just meant saying, "Whatever happens, it's going to be okay." And he could speak with some authority, having buried his teenage daughter a few years earlier -- she had died suddenly of natural causes. If he could survive that and still have faith, that at least told me it could be done.

I came to think eventually that my problem was that I was treating trust passively rather than actively. That may work with people, but not with God. I trust you because I lent you fifty bucks and you paid me back last week. I don't trust Joe because he made a pass at my wife. My trust is a reaction to others' actions.

But trusting God is different. It requires me to take an active approach. I have to make the decision that whatever happens, I am going to trust in God and not go back on it. This requires effort, at least for me.

So I've tried to adopt this attitude and so far I think it's going okay. I have my dark days, where nothing seems to be going right; you have probably heard my whining from wherever you live. You certainly can find it on this blog. But I have enough faith to believe this is ultimately a destructive and unhelpful attitude, and that I can find a better one if I put in the effort.

What the heck; I've come this far.

Bad affirmations.

Every day in every way, I get one day older.

There are no problems, only opportunities to fail.

Pain is just weakness leaving the body, so don’t bother consulting medical professionals. I’m sure it’s nothing.

Mediocre is just half-bad.

You are a human being, not a human doing. So stop all the doing for a while. You'll just lose a lot of traction, is all.

Opportunity knocks. You're probably in the can.

I took the road less traveled, and that has made all the difference. It sucked like you would not believe.

Those who dare, lose the college fund.

Keep your head down.

When one door closes, you’re stuck outside. Don't try breaking a window or we'll call the cops.

No one can make you feel inferior without your consent unless they’re in a position of power over you or are just really good at it.

Even the worst day lasts just 24 hours.

You are surrounded by idiots.

Most businesses fail.

Decide you will do mighty things right after breakfast. Then you can go pout on the sofa after lunch.

Be bold, and many people will come to tell you to stop being an asswipe.

Laugh and the world edges away from you nervously.

All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy, but his mortgage is paid.

If you don’t leap, you’ll never fall.

The nail that sticks out is the one that gets hammered.

It just doesn't matter.

Today's jerk with his head stuck in his wastepaper basket is tomorrow's snotty supervisor.

Every cloud has a mass of droplets or frozen crystals. Looks like rain.

What doesn’t kill you probably cripples you for life.

2017, man.

I'm ready to give up on 2017 already. If we can be this miserable with all the blessings we have in this nation now, then I don't see what we can dream about in 2017 that will make us happier.

Seriously, what do we hope for? If we say "An end to all war and poverty and racism and unfairness" we must be hoping to die and go to heaven, because that's not how things work down here. We can't even stop fighting with members of our family or the people next door or the schmuck in line at the supermarket and we expect nations to stop fighting? Please.

Many of our problems stem from willful stupidity, and I don't see that going away next year either. Here's an example.

I noted yesterday that I didn't think the spate of celebrity passings made 2016 a particularly horrific year. For me, on that note, 2015 was much worse, as I lost nine friends. If I lived in a war zone or maybe the Villages, I could expect all those wakes and funerals, but I don't. (This year, by contrast, I had but one wake to attend.) One of the friends I buried in 2015 was a young man whose life was cut short by alcohol and drugs.

Now, how do you suppose some friends of that young man chose to pay tribute to him online the other day?

Cheers,

The world is full of idiots, and all of us can be stupid at some times about some things. Let us pray that in 2017 our lapses in judgment, which may be inevitable, will not be disastrous or cruel. 

Happy new year to you and yours. 

The lighter side of doom.

A friend of mine likes to say, "Everything in life is either a blessin' or a lesson." Despite that, he's still my friend.

I wish I had his attitude, I really do. I don't know if there's any hope I ever will. As I told him, I come from a long line of pessimists. It is the way of my people. When things go right, we are pleasantly surprised; when things go wrong, we get to say "I told you so." The feeling is that this gives us a natural superiority. But we wonder why we don't want to get out of bed in the morning.

There's a book I have never read, but the original 1992 edition had one of my all-time favorite covers:

To be fair, co-author Doris Flexner also wrote The Optimist's Guide to History. But that book is not still in print. The Pessimist's Guide still is. In its third edition. My people are many.

Of course, there is a lot to be pessimistic about these days, what with the nation nominating felons and con artists to the highest office and all. We have defined deviancy down to the level of... well, exclusively of white Christian employed taxpaying males in committed monogamous heterosexual relationships. Our culture is garbage, our enemies sharpen their knives, and our leaders only see foes among their fellow citizens.

These things have a tendency to make SMOD look like the man of the hour, even though he is an extinction level event. Or rather, because he is an extinction level event.

Our problem is America is that we've always been too optimistic. Our stupid sunniness has not prepared us for such crappy times as are descending. That's one edge the Russians have over us: they're completely used to things going to hell and gone. It's not that they're dumb; as P. J. O'Rourke wrote in Eat the Rich, "In Russia... where chess is a spectator sport, they're boiling stones for soup."

Maybe the Russians lost the Cold War because they didn't want to get out of bed in the morning. Whatever. As we slide down the chute to domestic chaos and international strife, we may be able to draw wisdom from this wonderful video, "Complete History of the Soviet Union, Arranged to the Music of Tetris," courtesy of Pig with the Face of a Boy (via IMAO and the People's Cube). If, as some folks I know think, a Hillary presidency will take us farther down the road to Communist dictatorship, at least we can try to think of a catchy tune to go with it.