Category: Arts & culture

Jane Doe Inc.

As those of us here in Cohasset continue to follow the story of Ana Walshe — she’s the woman who disappeared on January 1, and whose husband has been arrested for lying to investigators — I thought it might be worth highlighting the work of Jane Doe Inc.: The Massachusetts Coalition Against Sexual Assault and Domestic Violence (JDI).

The JDI website has excellent resources for learning more about “sexual assault, domestic violence, stalking, harassment, violence against women, and other forms of gender-based violence.” I’ve been reading through some of them, and I can recommend them as honest and factual. Do be aware that the detailed lists and narratives for domestic violence homicide victims can be difficult reading.

This is such an important issue that cuts across class, race, and community. I just wish more of my fellow Unitarian Universalists paid more attention to ending domestic violence.

If you’re worried about domestic violence in your life, JDI lists the following:
Safelink: 1-877-785-2020 is a 24-hour, free and confidential multi-lingual domestic violence hotline in Massachusetts
To find the domestic violence program nearest you outside of Massachusetts, call the National Domestic Violence Hotline: 800-799-SAFE (800-799-7233).

Words of wisdom to media representatives

We’re having an interfaith prayer vigil this afternoon, for Cohasset resident Ana Walshe. (I just tested positive for COVID, so I can’t go.) Since this is a story that’s been in the news, as soon as word got out about the prayer vigil, our church started getting calls from media representatives.

One of the media representatives who called First Parish was just plain rude. An email we got sounded pushy and not at all sympathetic. Another church got a call offering to help publicize the event for us, something we really don’t want. The attitude of media representatives seems to be, “We need news, and you’re going to provide it for us!”

So here are some words of wisdom to media representatives:

  • It would be wise for you to remember to follow the norms of ordinary politeness. If you are rude, we won’t forget.
  • It would be wise for you to remember that you may be talking to someone who has strong feelings about this issue. If you sound callous or uncaring, we won’t forget.
  • It would be wise for you to remember that we don’t need you any more to publicize local events. Social media and word of mouth work better.

All of which can be boiled down to: Treat people nicely.

Update: This afternoon, I received email from a reporter asking for an interview. I replied that I had COVID and was not able to give an interview. The reporter said they hoped I’d feel better. How nice! You can be sure that I remembered that person’s name, and if they contact me again I will be predisposed to talk with them.

Songs and signs — Isaiah 13:15-16 and Genesis 19:6-8

Religion News Service reports:

“If you’re an exvangelical who has been scrolling through TikTok lately, you may have stumbled across a duo singing what sounds suspiciously like evangelical worship music. Until you hear the lyrics. ‘Anyone who is captured will be cut down and run through with a sword,’ they sing in harmony, guitar strums in sync. ‘Their little children will be dashed to death before their eyes.'” [They’re quoting Isaiah 13:15-16 from the Bible.]

I recommend watching the TikTok video. It’s quite well done. And it makes you think.

It reminds me of some Unitarian Universalist teens I knew twenty years ago, long before the days of TikTok. Their eyes had been caught by the fans at sports events who held up signs reading “John 3:16.” This Bible verse is the favorite of traditional Christians: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” It is supposed to entice nonbelievers into becoming Christians.

In response, these Unitarian Universalist teens decided that they were going to make a sign that read “Genesis 19:6-8” and hold it up during a Red Sox game. That’s the Bible passage where a mob besieges Lot’s house, because he’s hiding some angels from God. The mob demands that Lot throw the angels out to them, so they can lynch them. But instead Lots offers to throw his virgin daughters out to the mob to be raped by them. He’d rather sacrifice his daughters than betray the angels.

The Bible is a complex book. It contains some good ethical writing, it has some profound mystical moments, but it also contains passages that are difficult to interpret, and it has icky bits as well. You can’t just pick out the dozen verses you especially enjoy, and ignore the difficult parts and the icky bits.

Elon’s jet

You’ve probably heard about the website Elon’s Jet, which tracks one of Elon Musk’s private jets (he apparently has several; this just happens to be the one he uses most often).

Well, the person running that website just calculated the total carbon emissions of Elon’s jet in the year 2022 — 1,895 tons of CO² emissions. This has been posted on Mastodon, and as you’d expect people are having fun doing some additional math.

One Mastodonian pointed out that Musk’s CO² emissions from jet flight alone in 2022 are about 122 times the total carbon footprint of the average US resident; or about 370 times the total carbon footprint of the average person in the world. Yet another Mastodonian calculated that Musk’s jet produces more carbon emissions in a single day than the average US car produces in a year. And a particularly cynical Mastodonian noted: “I’m sure we can offset most of that CO² if we all collectively drink with cardboard straws.”

I will note in conclusion that Musk banned Elon’s Jet from Twitter, claiming that releasing this information could endanger his children, who sometimes fly on the jet. I would suggest that Musk is doing far more to endanger his children by flying his damn jet, and accelerating climate change.

Grumpiness and ukuleles

Three of us were in the office in the early afternoon. Each of us was feeling a little bit grumpy. Each of us was glad to be done with 2022, and hoping that 2023 will be a little bit better.

I told them my theory. Here we are, three years into a pandemic. Historically, pandemics have ended after a year and a half. But this pandemic is still going strong. I told them about this article I read that blamed the Ukraine war on the pandemic — Putin took advantage of societal chaos to launch his war.

I think I might even blame the pandemic for what happened in the U.S. House of Representatives today. The Republicans could not elect a Speaker of the House. Sure, we can blame it on right-wing extremists and ideologues. But I suspect part of the reason that people are voting right wing extremists and ideologues into office is that people are afraid and angry and doing stupid things like voting for people who can’t and won’t govern effectively.

It’s time to start playing ukulele again. I’ll never be a good ukulele player, but who cares. Pick up a ukulele, and you can’t help smiling. To quote George Harrison: “[The uke] is one instrument you can’t play and not laugh.”

Even if I can’t play it very well, a uke makes me feel better. Especially if it’s Carol’s uke, the one with blue flowers painted on it.

Me holding a ukulele with blue flowers painted on it.
Carol’s uke

Reviving the Perry Mason project

More than a decade ago, I created a checklist on this blog listing all the Perry Mason novels. I planned to write notes on each novel, talking about recurring characters, recurring or unusual plot devices, and mention of any interesting legal points. This project was abandoned for a number of years, but I finally decided to revive it (though it will remain on the back burner). Here it is: Perry Mason novels.

Part of the reason I’m putting this out there again is I have a faint hope that someone else who’s a fan of the Perry Mason novels will find the checklist, and contribute to it.

InCoWriMo

Scott wells no longer does much with his blog, but he’s active on Mastodon. And one of his Mastodon posts pointed me to InCoWriMo, or International Correspondence Writing Month.

The month is February. The idea is to write letters to random people all over the world. The tagline is “Vintage Social Media.”

How it works: People post their mailing addresses to the InCoWriMo website. Other people (maybe you, maybe me) write letters to them. I’m giving you enough advance notice so you can start watching their website.

When does personhood begin?

Judge Heather A. Welch, of the Marion Superior Court, Indiana, has issued a preliminary injunction against Indiana’s new anti-abortion law, SEA 1. The state of Indiana had previously passed the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, which strengthens protections for the freedom to practice religion. Following the passage of SEA 1, Hoosier Jews for Choice and several anonymous plaintiffs sought an injunction, claiming that because of their religion (or lack of religion) they sincerely believed that life does not begin at conception. Thus, preventing them from having an abortion would violate their freedom to practice their religion.

In the Findings of Fact in the Order of Preliminary Injunction, Judge Welch reviews the beliefs of several religious traditions regarding when personhood begins (section III. B., pp. 8 ff.). Welch reviews the beliefs of five religious traditions: Judaism, Islam, Unitarian Universalism, Paganism, and Episcopalianism. The judge finds that all five of these religious traditions have beliefs that do not place the beginning of personhood at the moment of conception.

Judge Welch’s summary of Unitarian Universalist beliefs is only two paragraphs long. For those of us who are Unitarian Universalists, those two paragraphs are worth reading:

“iii. Unitarian Universalism

“23. The Unitarian Universalist community has long supported reproductive justice. (Declaration of Reverend Catherine Josephine Romano Griffin ¶ 7). A core belief of Unitarian Universalists is that every human being has inherent worth and dignity, which is an endowed right bestowed by the Creator. (Id. ¶ 8).

“24. Denying a pregnant person, the ability to obtain an abortion impinges on this endowed right. (Id. ¶ 10). Therefore, being denied the ability to obtain an abortion when a Unitarian Universalist believes the abortion is necessary breaks the covenant that adherents have to honor their own inherent worth and dignity. (Id. ¶ 11). In this situation, a Unitarian Universalist is directed to obtain an abortion to maintain the covenant. (Id.).”

(“Catherine Josephine Romano Griffin” is Katie Romano Griffin, who began serving as the minister of All Souls Unitarian Church, Indianapolis, this year.)

I’m interested to see how Judge Welch interprets one particular Unitarian Universalist belief. She writes: “that every human being has inherent worth and dignity, which is an endowed right bestowed by the Creator.” For someone like me, who spends way too much time thinking about Unitarian Universalist theology and philosophy, the last half of that sentence, “endowed right bestowed by the Creator,” is not correct. But I admit that it would take me several paragraphs to give a correct explanation of where inherent worth and dignity comes from. And then I’d have to write several more pages explaining why the word “inherent” needs to be carefully interpreted to avoid an inaccurate or even wrong understanding, and furthermore how understanding “worth and dignity” turns out to be far more complicated than it might appear. I think I’d also need to add several more pages explaining how the vagueness of the term “Creator” could lead to some fairly serious theological and philosophical misunderstandings.

But you know what? Judge Welch’s account is close enough for legal purposes.

One final comment: Even though I’ve long been uncomfortable with the Unitarian Universalist “seven principles,” I learned something from reading this ruling. As much as I want to revise the seven principles, there is enough specificity there to help a judge write a pretty good ruling.

The first rapper

I always thought of Gil Scot-Heron as the godfather of rap. But Ted Brooks and the Jubalaires antedated him by a couple of decades.

The Jubalaires formed as the Royal Harmony Singers in the late 1930s. Coming out of the Southern gospel tradition of Jubilee-style quartets, the Jubalaires went north to New York City. By 1946, they were regulars on the popular Arthur Godfrey radio program, and they had their own fifteen-minute program every Sunday morning as well. They were accompanied by a series of excellent jazz guitarists, but their music was mostly focused on tight vocal harmonies. As a gospel group, the topic of many of their songs was Bible stories or other religious topics.

So where does the rap come in? Well, one of their best known recordings is a song called “Noah.” After singing an introductory part in four-part harmony, baritone Theodore “Ted” Brooks takes the lead. But Brooks doesn’t sing, he raps. It wasn’t called rap back then, but today there’s no other word for it. His rhythm, his rhymes, the whole feel of it sounds a lot like some of the early rap I listened to back around 1980. I could almost imagine that Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five had listened to Ted Brooks, except that the members of that group were born in the late 1950s and early 1960s, well after the hey-day of the Jubalaires. And of course, Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five did not take Bible stories for their topics. But if they had — if they had done something about the story of Noah, for example — we could imagine that it might have sounded something like Ted Brooks in the mid-1940s:

“Hey children, stop, be still and listen to me,
When God walked down to the brandy sea
He declared that the evil descend from man,
And then he decided to destroy the land.
He spoke to Noah, and Noah stopped.
He said, ‘Noah, I want you to build me an ark,
‘I want you to build it three cubits long,
‘I want you to build it big and strong,
‘I want it thirty high and fifty wide
‘So it will stand the wind and tide.’…”

Black and white photo of four men wearing 1940s style suits and ties. One man stands in the center, and is the lead singer. The three others stand around and behind him.
Screen grab from a video of “Noah” by the Jubalaires, c. 1946. Ted Brooks is in the center.

Hard to believe that the first rapper was making rhymes about Bible stories. Now I’ve got to figure out a way to use this in a Sunday school curriculum….

More Jubalaires with rapped verses: God’s Gonna Cut You Down (not sure who takes the lead on this recording; this was later covered by Johnny Cash); The Preacher and the Bear (is that Caleb Ginyard taking the lead? I’m not sure).

Voices

I was talking with one of the elders in our congregation this afternoon. Somehow, we got to talking about classical music. She happened to know a great deal about opera, and asked me if I knew Ileana Cotrubas. I didn’t. She played me a short recording.

Now, I tend to prefer mezzo-sopranos to sopranos, and non-operatic sopranos to operatic sopranos; give me Jan De Gaetani or Catherine King over Beverly Sills or Maria Callas any day. So I did not expect to like Ileana Cotrubas.

But, to my surprise, I really liked the recordings she played for me: a lovely warm voice that didn’t get brittle on the high notes; extraordinary articulation; not too much vibrato. So I’ve just spent way too much time on Youtube listening to Cotrubas — like this recording of her singing an aria from La Boheme.

This reminded me of a visit Carol and I paid to my father in his last year. He was wheelchair bound, couldn’t talk; it was hard to know how much cognitive ability he had left. He had always been a real opera buff, so Carol and I decided to play some Youtube recordings of opera for him. I found a recording of Beverly Sills, and started to play it. Dad’s face turned into a big scowl. “Oops, sorry Dad,” I said. “I forgot that you don’t like Beverly Sills.” Actually, it was worse than that, he actively disliked her, saying her voice was too hard or brittle or something, I’ve forgotten exactly what now. So I quickly found a recording of Maria Callas; he always liked Maria Callas. His scowl went away, and we spent several happy minutes listening to Maria Callas. (Mind you, I don’t care for Maria Calls, but I was happy that we found something that gave Dad pleasure.)

It’s funny how I, like my father, have these visceral, unreasoning, and very strong preferences regarding vocal quality. There are some singers that I want to listen to, and other singers — as much as I might appreciate their artistry or expertise — that I’d rather avoid. This applies to speakers, too. So, for example, there are some ministers whose artistry I admire, but I don’t want to listen to them; and there are other ministers to whom I’m always ready to listen.

My mother would have said, “They can’t help their voice,” excusing those people whose voices I don’t like. Sorry, Mom. It’s completely irrational, but there it is. And — sorry, Dad, that I ever thought you’d want to listen to Beverly Sills….