Usufruct - A Term We Should All Know

Too many things are crashing together.  Brent Scarpo week is coming up and as a Healing Racism Steering Committee member I'll be involved with that during the week.  I want to get more video of him up, but I'll have live stuff probably soon and won't need to use the leftover skype video.  And my book club is meeting Monday night putting me in a conflict with Brent's Monday night talk.

It's especially vexing since I really like the book we're reading - Charles Wohlforth's The Fate Of Nature.   And Wohlforth is scheduled to be there.  Oh dilemmas.  And so I'm racing to finish it today and tomorrow.  It's an amazing book, using Alaska as a case study to explore the BIG ISSUES - the nature of human beings (cooperative or competitive?) and is our nature compatible with the survival of the world's ecosystem?   He takes us to unexpected places and introduces us to interesting people and their concepts and then ties them all together - a lot of time in Prince William Sound from the visit of Captain Cook,  the Russians, Cordova as it has changed from the time of the Kennicott Mine.  And Chenega from old village days, through its destruction during the 1964 earthquake, to the creation of Chugach Alaska after the passage of the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act (ANCSA).   That's just a few of the many things covered.  And they all help illustrate a long array of ideas and theories.

There's also a section on early environmentalists nationally and how they impacted Alaska - particularly Gifford Pinchot, who was a major force in creating Chugach National Forest.  But before Pinchot, there was George Perkins Marsh who published, in 1864, The Earth as Modified by Human Action.  Wohlforth writes:

"He explained the fragility of ecosystems, the special qualities of old-growth forest, the potential to permanently damage soil, wetlands, rivers, and ocean, and he argued that environmental abuse similar to that rampant in the United States had brought about the collapse of ancient civilizations around the Mediterranean Sea.  Marsh used a legal term to define humanity's proper relationship to the earth:  usufruct, which means a loan for use only, with the obligation to leave the borrowed item as it was found."  (p. 143)(emphasis added)

Instead of reading more yesterday, I was at the CCL meeting and then at the One People, One Earth meeting - both discussing man's impact on the earth's ecosystem.  Both, in their own ways, dealing with the idea usufruct.  I also saw Penny Arcade's show at Out North last night.  More on that later, but briefly, it's the adults only version of what Brent Scarpo will be doing this week.  Penny Arcade, who was part of Andy Warhol's crowd, will perform for a couple more weekends.  But I've got to get back to reading, and there's a driveway to shovel, and a few other things to distract me.  But just lying in bed this morning reading and reading was a real pleasure.  And the end of daylight savings time gave me an extra hour. 

Religion and Climate Change - Citizens Climate Lobby Meeting

Back at the Bioneers conference which seems so long ago, but was only October 15, I met Jim Thrall who had a table for the Citizen's Climate Lobby. Jim's a retired scientist with a PhD in something like acqautic ecology, and he's also a returned Peace Corps volunteer.  CCL was created by Marshall Saunders in California based on the model of Results - a citizen lobbying group for overcoming world hunger and poverty. Once he got that taken care of. . . no, I guess that didn't happen yet, but he did see real progress based on Results model, so he used it as the basis for the Citizens Climate Lobby which he founded in 2007. In his words:

It seemed to me that Congress was doing things exactly backwards. Why? Because it is dominated by special interests, in this case the fossil fuel industry. In my heart I knew something else was at play: Ordinary people were not asking their members of Congress for anything regarding climate change, not in an organized and effective way. Furthermore, they didn’t know what to do or how to do it, nor did they have self-confidence and support they needed. Citizens Climate Lobby’s purpose is to change all that by empowering individuals to have breakthroughs in exercising their personal and political power and by gaining the tools to be effective with government.

Jim was explaining all this to me and I took notes, but I have no idea where they are.  But Citizens Climate Change has a good website, so I can tell you this stuff.


Basically, they get people together who are concerned about climate change and help them organize their message and get it to their representatives in Washington DC.  Just like every other group that wants to successfully get their projects through legislative bodies.  They meet once a month - the first Saturday - with local folks and and by phone to the National organization and the various chapters around the country and in Canada.

So, today is the first Saturday and Jim invited me to come to see what they were doing.   The phone was out and we got to hear Dr. Katharine Hayhoe, atmospheric scientist and co-author of 'A Climate for Change: Global Warming Facts for Faith-Based Decisions.'
She was discussing how to talk to church groups about global warming.  There were two things to avoid:

1. The age of the earth.  She said that some groups shut down if you talked about the earth being over 7000 years old and it wasn't necessary.  There's enough data in the last 7000 years to make the argument for climate change.
2. Al Gore.  For some reason, the conservative faith based groups can't stand Al Gore, and to get through to many people you have separate him and global warming ideas.

These seem to be deeply held issues and spending time on them distract from the main message, so it's best to avoid them.

There were also things she says when talking to faith based communities:

1.  Her own faith in God and that humans are the stewards of God's creation - there's very little theology that needs to be agreed on here
2. God created the earth
3. Jesus gave us the responsibility to love our neighbors and care for the poor - and global warming is having the biggest harmful effects already on the poorest

I don't think she says it quite like that at synagogues, but the sense I got was that she was mostly focused on Christian denominations.

Then she had the elevator speech on global warming:

1. The planet is warming, and it's not just thermometers, but also changes in birds, insects, trees, it's in everyone's backyards
2. It's not like any previous cycle - if it were we would be getting cooler because the sun has been in one of its lower energy cycles which would should have cooled us
3. Since the Industrial Revolution began, we've been producing heat capturing gases. 

You can hear the whole discussion at their website.   Or you can listen to past presentations from this page.

One of the issues that came up, that I was only vaguely aware of, was that various faith based organizations had come out with their own stands on climate change.   The Catholic Church's Report came out in May and the NY Times reports:

"The widespread loss of ice and snow in the world's mountain glaciers is some of the clearest evidence we have for global changes in the climate system," concludes the analysis, which will be delivered to Pope Benedict XVI. It was assembled by an international team of experts at the behest of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, the Vatican's non-denominational scientific arm.

The report warns of "serious and potentially irreversible impacts of global warming caused by the anthropogenic emissions of greenhouse gases, and by changes in forests, wetlands, grasslands, and other land uses," urging steep cuts in the world's output of heat-trapping pollutants.

Failure to do so will imperil vulnerable ecosystems and human societies that depend on glaciers for freshwater, it says, including a huge swath of Central Asia where mountain glaciers store water for millions of people. Inaction also leaves some communities vulnerable to flooding from unstable meltwater lakes that can burst without warning, causing outburst floods and mudslides.

"We are committed to ensuring that all inhabitants of this planet receive their daily bread, fresh air to breathe and clean water to drink as we are aware that, if we want justice and peace, we must protect the habitat that sustains us," the document continues. "The believers among us as God to grant us this wish."

Presbyterians also have a report acknowledging climate change and the need for mitigation.

Southern Baptists have a Declaration on the Environment and Climate Change that is relatively timid, but nevertheless acknowledges that humans have contributed to global warming.  The have four statements:

• Statement 1
  Humans Must Care for Creation and Take Responsibility for Our Contributions to Environmental Degradation. 
• Statement 2
  It Is Prudent to Address Global Climate Change.
• Statement 3
  Christian Moral Convictions and Our Southern Baptist Doctrines Demand Our Environmental Stewardship. 
• Statement 4
  It Is Time for Individuals, Churches, Communities and Governments to Act.
  

 The American Baptists adopted a  Resolution on Global Warming in 1991!


Jim Thrall also mentioned the One People, One Earth -- Anchorage conference being held today at UAA which brought together climate scientists, interfaith leaders, and Native elders. I'll try to get some video from that up later.

On The Air with Tom Anderson - Where Can Bullies Get Help?

Last year, when Healing Racism in Anchorage brought Tim Wise to Anchorage he spoke on two conservative talk radio shows.  His topic was racism, which a lot of people still don't believe exists, and he was treated pretty shabbily by the hosts and some of the callers - and one of the hosts, right after he left, did a whole homophobic riff that was truly disgusting.

Tom Anderson on air

So when I put up the previous post, I was thinking of that experience.  In hindsight, I was overreacting.  Friday I knew that Tom Anderson would treat us with respect - he was a graduate student of mine long ago and I've kept in contact with him after his trial.   (There's too much stuff to write about the whole political corruption trial and aftermath to fit in here, to fit in any blog post.  The facts are out - at least in terms of trial results and prison sentences - but the best interpretations of what it all means are yet to be written. )  But I wasn't sure about the callers.

Tom now has a talk radio show and Brent Scarpo needs to get the word out about his talk next Monday at East High at 7pm.  So he called in from California and Tom asked if I'd come to the studio.  But I was just Brent's backup here.  This was about Brent and his work against hate and bullying and he was the main focus.

Chris, the technician who did all the work

I thought Brent was an interesting guest and he clearly knows a lot about the topic of hate and bullying.  Tom was a gracious host, but also conscious of trying to make things more interesting by being provocative in his questions.  There were no calls.  Because it was drive time?  (5-6pm)  Because it was boring for this audience?  Because people are shy about bullying an anti-bully expert?  Because no one was listening?  Because Tom wasn't antagonistic toward his guest?  Or maybe it's just because it's hard to stand up for bullies and hate.  At one point, Brent said he'd come to realize that bullies essentially were people who didn't like something about themselves and took it out on others.  And some take it out on themselves.  I asked where someone like that, who hears this and realizes Brent was talking about him or her, could go to get help.




Help for Bullies?

As I look online now, there's lots of stuff for victims of bullies, but it's hard to find stuff for bullies who want help.

Here's part of an article by Charles R. McAdams, III and Christopher D. Schmidt from the Journal of School Counseling on how to help bullies, but this is aimed at counselors, not at bullies:

Bullying is one of the most widely practiced forms of aggression in American schools. It is broadly defined as the actual or attempted infliction of injury or discomfort by one student on another student that is intentional, abusive, and based on an imbalance of power between bully and victim (Olweus, 1994; Sullivan, Cleary, & Sullivan, 2004). According to the National Center for Education Statistics--2002, almost one third of public schools have reported daily to weekly occurrences of student bullying (Hall, 2006). Research suggests that nearly half of today's students will experience some form of bullying during their education; however, rates of bullying as high as 81% for school-aged males and 72% for school-aged females have been reported in some studies (Casey-Cannon, Hayward, & Gowen, 2001; Charach, Pepler, & Ziegler, 1995; Farrington, 1993, as cited in Sanders, 2004). In a survey by the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, 1.7 million children (one in five) in grades 6 through 10 admitted bullying their classmates (Cole, Cornell, & Sheras, 2006). On the basis of current statistics, Hall has concluded that school climates nationwide have been dramatically altered by the actions of bullies.

It goes on to distinguish between reactive aggression and proactive aggression.  

Reactive aggression is characterized as a "hot-blooded," automatic, defensive response to immediate and often misperceived threat (Hubbard, Dodge, Cillessen, Coie, & Schwartz, 2001; Wood & Gross, 2002). Youth exhibiting reactive aggression are characterized as seeking but lacking close interpersonal relationships with significant adults such as parents--relationships they need to learn how to effectively attend to, understand, and take into account others' intentions (Dodge, 1991).  .  .

Unlike reactive aggression, proactive aggression does not characteristically occur as an emotion-laden, defensive response to immediate threat. Instead, it is described as organized, purposeful, and often premeditated rather than automatic (Galezewski, 2005). Aggression for proactive aggressors has, over an extended time, become an internalized means of achieving personal security, competence, and control in their lives (Cottle, 2004; McAdams & Lambie, 2003). In the real or perceived absence of affirmation from significant others (parents, in particular), they have come to derive a sense of self-efficacy from their ability to succeed without, and often at the expense of, others. The propensity of proactive aggressors toward generalized hostility and antisocial behavior appears to have two origins: one being an overt manifestation of internalized resentment and anger over frustrated needs for security, and another being a mechanism by which they keep others far enough at bay so as not to endanger their desired autonomy and self-sufficiency (Arsenio & Lemerise, 2004; McAdams, 2002).   [emphasis added]

Here's an article titled "Help for Bullies and Victims"  but I didn't see where it offered help for bullies.

Here's a piece by a clinical psychologist, Karen Cairns, who, after giving a list of statistics (ie 160,000 kids who stay home from school due to bullying every day!) and programs being set up for victims of bullies, goes on to say that bullies are usually victims of bullies themselves.

But, I would like to see this issue treated at the root of the problem: Bullies are bullied. With the exception of mental illness, bullies are usually victims of bullying. The cycle of violence usually goes back generations. If you were beaten or verbally abused, it becomes an option for you to become the aggressor. I’ve worked with offenders who think there are only 2 choices: be the victim, or be the bully. They feel strong and in control while bullying others. They hate the abuse they have suffered, but feel no compassion for their own victims. I would like to see programs that address the reason they became bullies. Anger management is effective, but it doesn’t protect the bully from the abuse they may be receiving at home or elsewhere. Bullies are abused, and sometimes they become abusers. Then they get punished for their behavior. We need to intervene at the beginning of this cycle. I would like to suggest that if a student is accused and proven to be a bully, he or she should be referred for a psychological evaluation to determine the root of the cause. Bullies need help. Without help, without intervention, the cycle will continue.

Near the end of page 2 of my google search, I found this, apparently new (oldest entry is Oct. 29, most recent is Oct. 31) website offering Help for Bullies.  But there isn't too much there yet.  The header says:

This is a site for bullies! I am a school counselor. There are hundreds of websites and resources for victims of bullies. That's a good thing. But there are few resources for bullies. That's NOT a good thing! Bullies ae human too–bullies need help, just as their victims need help. If you are a bully, or if you sometimes find yourself engaged in bullying behaviors, then this site is for YOU! If you are a victim of bullying, this site will help you understand your offender.

Bully Free Kids is aimed at parents, teachers, and employers.   But not at kids.


I went through google page seven with the search words "Help For Bullies".  I'm sure there must be more out there than the two - Karen Cairns' piece and Help For Bullies.  But if I were a bully looking for a way out, I'd have to work pretty hard to find it on line.

J and I watched the Shawshank Redemption Friday night.  Brent Scarpo was one of the casting directors on the film and there's plenty of bullying in there.  I can see how it got Brent's wheels spinning on this topic.  

I hope readers will get a chance to see or hear Brent at one of his events.  The main public event is Monday Nov. 7 at 7pm at the East High Auditorium.  It's free.

There's a workshop for trainers, teachers, supervisors and others who want more detailed work on how to stop bullying in their sphere of influence.  That's Tuesday, 5:30-9 at Credit Union 1 in Mt. View.  It's limited to 30, so reserve a space by emailing Healing Racism in Anchorage. 

Brent and Me Brave Fox - 5pm Anchorage Today 1020 on am

Brent Scarpo's still south, but he's calling in to Tom Anderson's Ironically Speaking show at FOX.  Here's the info: 

Call in at 907 522-1020 or listen online at www.1020koan.com

We're going to need some of you watching our backs.

 Brent will be here next week meeting with a variety of organizations.  A public talk is Monday 7pm at East High Auditorium.  It's free. 

Why Don't Kids Tell Their Parents They're Being Bullied?

On this video clip, Brent Scarpo explains what people should  expect when they come to his presentation Monday night.  It's brief, but he mentions 20 signs that your child is being bullied - one of which is why they don't tell their parents.  He also talks about how he interacts with the kids.  He says he's gives them permission to say what's really on their minds and then he listens. He'll also cover cyber-bullying.




So listen to the video [the synch at the end got messed up when I uploaded it to YouTube, sorry]and come see him in person with your questions Monday night at 7pm at East High School auditorium.  It's FREE. 

There's also still room in the Tuesday night workshop - it's $50.  See more at the Healing Racism website. 

The video is from a skype interview I did with Brent October 25.  There's a previous video on why he went from being a casting director for films like the Shawshank Redemption to making his own anti-hate movie and making personal appearances like he's going to do next week in Anchorage.

Moshe's Eagle

Monday at Primrose Campground, Moshe had his camera out when a bald eagle flew over us not too high and he got these great shots.  Not bad for a guy on his third day in Alaska with a borrowed camera. 

Blue Sky to Matanuska Glacier

I checked to see what Moshe was up to today.  Monday was great, but it was a black and white day and he didn't really get to see a big glacier.  But the sky was cloudless today and I was up for getting him to the Matanuska Glacier. 

But it was windy, windy enough for there to be lots of dust.  There wasn't that much snow out of Palmer and the wind funneling down the river bed from the glacier picked up, as you can see, plenty of dust. 

 

The river with King Mountain in the background.

As we got closer to the glacier, there was more snow and the wind sculpted it.

 

 I guess with all the snow here, there wasn't any dust to blow into the air.

24 Hour Movie Clock - Playing With Time

Not very many people would have thought up this project. And few of those would actually execute it. But Christian Marclay has. He's put together a movie made up of thousands of film clips which, collectively, become a 24 hour clock.

Here are three videos on this.

The first a news report.


The second a 3 minute segment of the movie itself.


The third, asks Christian himself about the work.




I haven't seen much more of this that you. But this has to make viewers think about how important clock time is in movies, which roughly reflect our lives. I wonder what venue in Anchorage could show this for 24 hours a day.  Bear Tooth?  Museum?  Out North?

Thanks L for the tip.

Cain and Lin in 2012

OK, in 2008 the Republicans nominated McCain and Palin.

So, as Herman Cain is stepping into the Republican primary spotlight, does this mean the Republicans think the last candidate's name was good, but a bit too long?

If they nominate Cain, should they also nominate a vice president that reduces the 2008 candidate's name by the first two letters? Someone named Lin?

This could lead to some interesting possibilities.  Let me offer some prospects.

The only Governor Lin (since Palin was a governor at the time, let's start there) I could find is Governor Junq-tzer Lin of Taiwan. This, at first, seems like insurmountable odds, but given that so many Republicans think that Obama is a Kenyan citizen, I really don't see the problem. They can tell their followers his Taiwan birth certificate is a fake and he was really born in San Francisco. Or better yet, that Taiwan is the 51st US state. That, of course, won't go down well with China. But they could show this is the chance for the US and China to reach unprecedented cooperation. I'm sure the people who come up with all the Republican talking points can work this out.

It's hard to find American politicians with the last name of Lin. So we should consider others, who, like Cain himself, is not a politician.

There's Sherry Lin, an investor.  She should fit right in.  She could pull in the female and Asian vote.  Though she has degrees from Columbia and Northwestern which may pose a problem for anti-elitists. 


 Maya Lin, also could appeal the female and Asian vote.  The sculptor who designed the Vietnam Veterans' Memorial offers name recognition that Sherry Lin doesn't have.  And she was born in Ohio, an important state in the next election.  An artist as VP doesn't sound too Republican. Maybe she can be in charge of a jobs program that would build long monuments to freedom, perhaps a modern version of the Statue of Liberty, along the Mexican and Canadian borders. 

True 'Lins' are hard to come by in the US, so what about settling for a spelling variation, like Lynn?

There's Alaska's Republican State Rep. Bob Lynn.  That allows the Republicans to try again with an Alaskan VP candidate, gives them a proud veteran of the Air Force, a blogger, and a musician who played the alto sax six times in the Rose Bowl Parade as a member of the Los Angeles Sheriff's Boys Band. Lots of pluses here.

Kansas' State Senator Julia Lynn has blond hair, is a Republican, and supported  a conference report that prohibits any individual or group health insurance policy from covering elective abortions, which I'm sure helped her get her 100 rating from the Americans for Prosperity - Kansas Chapter.

Wait, here's a perfect one:  Former Tennessee Representative Susan Lynn.  She now works for ALEC - the Koch brothers supported group that writes model legislation for state representatives who want to dismantle government.  And she's a civil libertarian - she sponsored legislation that  

"would prevent Tennesseans from being coerced or required by either the private sector or the government to have an RFID chip inserted into their body. Similar legislation passed the Georgia Senate last week, it is being voted upon in Virginia and it has already passed in several other states."

Republicans might like the state being restricted there, but it seems an unfair intrusion into the rights of businesses to do whatever they want.  But an earlier quote Lynn made cited by Tennessee reporter Jeff Woods clears this up.  There's a reason for her passion here:

As the bill's sponsor, Rep. Susan Lynn, explained to Pith when her proposal first came up a couple of years ago, "In the Christian religion, and I'm a Christian, in the book of Revelation, there was a reference to, you know, the Mark of the Beast. Some people interpret that to be one of these microchips." Lynn concedes "it's hard to say" whether microchips are actually Satan's stamp. "Other people think it could be some type of tattoo," she explains.

Straying a bit further, they may want to allow someone with the first name of Lynn. I offer:

 Gov. Lynn Frazier of North Dakota. The biggest negative here is that he's been dead since 1947, but if you believe that, you probably believe that global warming is real and caused by humans. Another possible negative is that he founded the Bank of North Dakota, the only state run bank. Did I mention that he was the first US governor to be recalled? And he wasn't really a Republican, but ran in their primary as a Non-Partisan League candidate, whatever that means. Maybe that could be used as a cover to show the Republicans want want to work across party lines like they are trying to do with Obama, but he just blocks all their proposals. And Lynn (Frazier) was elected to the US Senate after he was recalled. Given the popularity of zombies, today, I think there's real possibility here.


And a first name that actually preserves the Lin spelling:

Gov. Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island.  This may be a stretch.  I don't even know if anyone calls him Lin.  But an advantage is that he's only been governor since January 2011, which would mean he'd have about as much experience as governor as Palin had when she was nominated.


As you can see, the possibilities here for the Republicans are endless.  Cain and Lin in 2012

Giving the Gift of Alaska - To Seward On A Black And White Day

We met Moshe at Congregation Beth Sholom Sunday where he gave a talk about how his community of Jews in Ethiopia walked for three weeks through Ethiopia to Sudan where they were in a refugee camp for 2 years before being able to complete their trip to Israel.  He's in Anchorage because of the PACT (Parents and Children Together)  program - which helps Ethiopian Jews get pre-school preparation to be ready for school.  Moshe himself benefited from this and is now a PACT coordinator in his town.  He was here, in part, to thank the people of Anchorage who have contributed to make this program possible.  He mentioned after the talk that he very much wanted to see a glacier and we offered to help him find a glacier Monday.

See the whole strip at REOiv

We decided to try for Exit Glacier and left in a light snow.  The day reminded me of one of my favorite Calvin and Hobbes cartoons.  Here are the key two panels from it.




                                                                                                                                                   Well, our world Monday was back in those old days when you could use color film, but the world itself was still black and white with only a few traces of the early colors showing.

Even without color, the drive to Seward is spectacular and our guest bubbled over with delight.  Sharing Alaska is such an easy gift to give. 

The roads were a bit tricky - and the drivers were getting used to the second day of snow.  And the clouds were really low as we left Anchorage.  Turnagain Arm was better, and things improved a bit as we went over Turnagain Pass.  Eventually, we saw our first hint of sun after the Hope turnoff. 

We took the turnoff to Exit Glacier, but didn't get very far and the road was closed.  That would have been a much longer walk than we were prepared for, especially in several inches of fresh snow.

So back to the main road and into Seward.  A stop at the harbor.

Then lunch at the Apollo.  (There was color still inside.)











Then off to Lowell Point to do a little beach walk on the world famous white 'sand' beach.

(Didn't I say up top this was a black and white day?)










We decided there had to be a lot of fish in this location.  Gulls were predominant, but there were cormorants and what appeared to be loons as well.

Then to the southern shore of Kenai Lake at Primrose campground.  We could see sun on the distant mountains.

And Moshe got a spectacular shot of a bald eagle that flew low over us before taking a tree top perch.  He was rightfully proud of the picture and I'll put it up when he sends it to me.  [UPDATE Dec. 26: I posted the eagle pictures here, but forgot to add a link here.]
 

A short walk through the woods from the Primerose campground trail in the fresh snow.  The trees seemed to be dancing.

A little reflected sun and even some blue sky on the way back. 

And then off to Portage to see if we can find some glacier.  You could see about 30 feet out into the fogged in lake.  So we took the trail to Byron Glacier.  It was after 6pm and the sun had set and the snow was coming down thick.  I hadn't been to Byron in many years.  There isn't much left.  But there was an ice cave on the lower right side of the dark front of the ice and other glacial shapes in the oncoming evening light and falling snow.

It was still not quite dark when we got back to the car.  But once the car lights were on, it was, for all intents, dark out.  And on the highway back, the snow was blowing hard toward us.  Reflected in the headlights, it made it really hard to figure out where the road was.  The rumble strips were great, but it wasn't easy to tell if you were too far to the left or the right.

I didn't quite get it from the back seat, but this does give you the sense of how hard it was to orient to the road.  For once, the headlights of oncoming cars were helpful.

I hope there weren't too many typos.  I'm tired.