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babylonsister
babylonsister's Journal
babylonsister's Journal
October 1, 2023
There Are More of Us Than There Are of Them
by Lucian K. Truscott IV | October 1, 2023 - 6:41am
— from Salon
The 14th Amendment isn't going to save us from Donald Trump. Nor is a ruling in New York state that he defrauded multiple banks and insurance companies over a ten-year period. Nor are the 91 charges against him in his four criminal indictments. Nor is another ruling by a New York judge that he raped E. Jean Carroll and is liable for $5 million in civil damages. His base loves him for every scam he pulled, every norm he trashed, every law he broke.
There may be red state after red state across the South and Midwest voting for Trump every time he says "jump," but there aren't enough of them, and they don't have enough electoral votes. What will save us are our numbers. Republican presidential candidates have won the popular vote only once in the last 35 years, when George W. Bush beat John Kerry in 2004. In every other election, Democrats won the popular vote, even when they lost the election overall because of the electoral vote count. Put simply, there are more of us than there are of them.
snip//
Republicans are holding onto red states with gerrymandered majorities, but their control is slipping, and it is beginning to weaken in presidential election years. Georgia isn't going to go to the Republicans next year. Neither is Arizona. The abortion issue is beginning to turn reddish but competitive states like Ohio into toss-ups. Abortion is also costing Republicans votes of women in the suburbs and across the board in states like Kansas, which recently voted to keep abortion legal in the state by voting down a state constitutional amendment that would have made it illegal. Voters affirmed by referendum abortion rights in 2022 in California, Michigan and Vermont, and turned away statewide referendums that would have further restricted abortion rights in Kentucky and Montana.
Even if Republicans wanted to do something to appeal to voters more broadly, they are hamstrung by what we call the Trump base – voters in thrall to the man more than to the party. That base is White, and it's old, compared to voters in general, and they are headed into two decades when this country will get increasingly younger and less and less White.
This is not a good trend for the Republican Party, because politics is a game of numbers, and the numbers are going against them. It's good news for Democrats that there are more of us than there are of them, but only if we turn out and vote. We can't sit back and let the actuarial tables and the issue of abortion carry the day for us. There is power in numbers only if we exercise it with our votes. It's either that, or we won't have a vote that's worth anything anymore. Stand up and be counted. Vote.
There Are More of Us Than There Are of Them
http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/lucian-k-truscott-iv/107884/there-are-more-of-us-than-there-are-of-themThere Are More of Us Than There Are of Them
by Lucian K. Truscott IV | October 1, 2023 - 6:41am
— from Salon
The 14th Amendment isn't going to save us from Donald Trump. Nor is a ruling in New York state that he defrauded multiple banks and insurance companies over a ten-year period. Nor are the 91 charges against him in his four criminal indictments. Nor is another ruling by a New York judge that he raped E. Jean Carroll and is liable for $5 million in civil damages. His base loves him for every scam he pulled, every norm he trashed, every law he broke.
There may be red state after red state across the South and Midwest voting for Trump every time he says "jump," but there aren't enough of them, and they don't have enough electoral votes. What will save us are our numbers. Republican presidential candidates have won the popular vote only once in the last 35 years, when George W. Bush beat John Kerry in 2004. In every other election, Democrats won the popular vote, even when they lost the election overall because of the electoral vote count. Put simply, there are more of us than there are of them.
snip//
Republicans are holding onto red states with gerrymandered majorities, but their control is slipping, and it is beginning to weaken in presidential election years. Georgia isn't going to go to the Republicans next year. Neither is Arizona. The abortion issue is beginning to turn reddish but competitive states like Ohio into toss-ups. Abortion is also costing Republicans votes of women in the suburbs and across the board in states like Kansas, which recently voted to keep abortion legal in the state by voting down a state constitutional amendment that would have made it illegal. Voters affirmed by referendum abortion rights in 2022 in California, Michigan and Vermont, and turned away statewide referendums that would have further restricted abortion rights in Kentucky and Montana.
Even if Republicans wanted to do something to appeal to voters more broadly, they are hamstrung by what we call the Trump base – voters in thrall to the man more than to the party. That base is White, and it's old, compared to voters in general, and they are headed into two decades when this country will get increasingly younger and less and less White.
This is not a good trend for the Republican Party, because politics is a game of numbers, and the numbers are going against them. It's good news for Democrats that there are more of us than there are of them, but only if we turn out and vote. We can't sit back and let the actuarial tables and the issue of abortion carry the day for us. There is power in numbers only if we exercise it with our votes. It's either that, or we won't have a vote that's worth anything anymore. Stand up and be counted. Vote.
October 1, 2023
To beat Trump, strip away ‘strongman’ veneer to show weak, befuddled man within
Saturday, September 30, 2023 at 12:00:25p EDT
Hunter
A New York Times report on Thursday reveals the bleak message that Win It Back, a conservative anti-Donald Trump PAC, delivered to its donors. The group tested more than 40 ads, spent $6 million, and found that just about nothing made Republican voters abandon Dear Leader.
snip//
Anti-Trump groups haven't tested every message against Trump, and I still suspect he can be damaged by focusing on what frightens him most. He sells himself as an ultra-masculine, successful thug. Anti-Trump ads need to attack that image. Present testimonials of past business partners saying things like, "He cheats at everything," "He lies as easily as he breathes," "He's afraid of stairs," or "He says he's a billionaire, but he's faking the whole thing." Carving him up on those specific points—rather than trying to prod Republican voters into caring about their self-proclaimed beliefs—is likely to be more effective.
Republicans are drawn to Trump because his public performances are seen as enraging non-Republicans and "elites." But if anti-Trump Republicans portray him as a laughingstock? Maybe that’ll have traction.
Show the man as he appears on the golf course, not in his suit and tie. Mock him for being revealed as a business failure. Have former members of his administration who now oppose him laugh on camera as they tell viewers that he should be on “Dancing with the Stars,” not in the White House. Show him instead as a weak and pitiful figure whose best days have passed him by, a man who can't keep up with his own lies—an object of derision. Mock him so viciously that Trump's shallow, lib-owning base voters feel like suckers.
If ads like these were prolonged enough, Republican voters might not be able to brush them off so easily.
To beat Trump, strip away 'strongman' veneer to show weak, befuddled man within
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/9/30/2196309/-To-beat-Trump-strip-away-strongman-veneer-to-show-weak-befuddled-man-withinTo beat Trump, strip away ‘strongman’ veneer to show weak, befuddled man within
Saturday, September 30, 2023 at 12:00:25p EDT
Hunter
A New York Times report on Thursday reveals the bleak message that Win It Back, a conservative anti-Donald Trump PAC, delivered to its donors. The group tested more than 40 ads, spent $6 million, and found that just about nothing made Republican voters abandon Dear Leader.
snip//
Anti-Trump groups haven't tested every message against Trump, and I still suspect he can be damaged by focusing on what frightens him most. He sells himself as an ultra-masculine, successful thug. Anti-Trump ads need to attack that image. Present testimonials of past business partners saying things like, "He cheats at everything," "He lies as easily as he breathes," "He's afraid of stairs," or "He says he's a billionaire, but he's faking the whole thing." Carving him up on those specific points—rather than trying to prod Republican voters into caring about their self-proclaimed beliefs—is likely to be more effective.
Republicans are drawn to Trump because his public performances are seen as enraging non-Republicans and "elites." But if anti-Trump Republicans portray him as a laughingstock? Maybe that’ll have traction.
Show the man as he appears on the golf course, not in his suit and tie. Mock him for being revealed as a business failure. Have former members of his administration who now oppose him laugh on camera as they tell viewers that he should be on “Dancing with the Stars,” not in the White House. Show him instead as a weak and pitiful figure whose best days have passed him by, a man who can't keep up with his own lies—an object of derision. Mock him so viciously that Trump's shallow, lib-owning base voters feel like suckers.
If ads like these were prolonged enough, Republican voters might not be able to brush them off so easily.
October 1, 2023
All That Drama and the House GOP’s Only Win Was for the Kremlin
LOUD AND CLEAR
The Putin wing of the GOP made it crystal clear that of all their dangerous priorities, the most important was to strengthen America’s enemies and weaken our allies.
David Rothkopf
Published Sep. 30, 2023 10:57PM EDT
Had the great Maya Angelou been alive to witness Saturday’s climax of the omnishambolic dog’s breakfast of a misbegotten legislative process that took place in the U.S. House of Representatives, surely she would have said, “When a political party tells you over and over again that they have no higher priority than serving Vladimir Putin, believe them.”
Then, again, it didn’t take the genius of Ms. Angelou to get the message. At the critical moment at which they had one last chance to avert a government shutdown, when Republicans in the House were forced to abandon all of their legislative priorities but one, the one they chose to ditch was the vital U.S. aid to Ukraine. In so doing, they sent the world an unmistakable signal once again that the first and guiding loyalty of Donald Trump’s GOP is as it always has been to the Kremlin.
snip//
But something had to be given to the far right. The GOP needed some concession to make it seem as though their childish games had all been worth it. What did they choose? What was the one thing they said would be the last hill they would die on, the one issue so important to them that they would turn out the lights of the U.S. government to defend their position? It was to defund Ukraine aid. It was to settle for, in the words of progressive commentator Josh Marshall, “one sloppy kiss with Vladimir Putin.”
more...
https://www.thedailybeast.com/all-that-drama-and-house-republicans-only-win-was-for-the-kremlin?ref=home
All That Drama and the House GOP's Only Win Was for the Kremlin
All That Drama and the House GOP’s Only Win Was for the Kremlin
LOUD AND CLEAR
The Putin wing of the GOP made it crystal clear that of all their dangerous priorities, the most important was to strengthen America’s enemies and weaken our allies.
David Rothkopf
Published Sep. 30, 2023 10:57PM EDT
Had the great Maya Angelou been alive to witness Saturday’s climax of the omnishambolic dog’s breakfast of a misbegotten legislative process that took place in the U.S. House of Representatives, surely she would have said, “When a political party tells you over and over again that they have no higher priority than serving Vladimir Putin, believe them.”
Then, again, it didn’t take the genius of Ms. Angelou to get the message. At the critical moment at which they had one last chance to avert a government shutdown, when Republicans in the House were forced to abandon all of their legislative priorities but one, the one they chose to ditch was the vital U.S. aid to Ukraine. In so doing, they sent the world an unmistakable signal once again that the first and guiding loyalty of Donald Trump’s GOP is as it always has been to the Kremlin.
snip//
But something had to be given to the far right. The GOP needed some concession to make it seem as though their childish games had all been worth it. What did they choose? What was the one thing they said would be the last hill they would die on, the one issue so important to them that they would turn out the lights of the U.S. government to defend their position? It was to defund Ukraine aid. It was to settle for, in the words of progressive commentator Josh Marshall, “one sloppy kiss with Vladimir Putin.”
more...
https://www.thedailybeast.com/all-that-drama-and-house-republicans-only-win-was-for-the-kremlin?ref=home
September 29, 2023
Eric Swalwell Says Kevin McCarthy’s MAGA Team Is a Bunch of Creeps
THE NEW ABNORMAL
Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-CA) airs his views on the current state of Republican politics on this week’s episode of The New Abnormal.
The Daily Beast
Updated Sep. 29, 2023 3:16AM EDT / Published Sep. 29, 2023 12:59AM EDT
Colorado Rep. Lauren Boebert’s proposed amendment on Wednesday to reduce the salary of Shawn Skelly, the transgender Assistant Secretary of Defense for Readiness, to just $1, is proof that attacks on trans people are becoming more normalized.
That’s according to Congressman Eric Swalwell out of California’s 14th Congressional District, who joins The New Abnormal this week for a frank discussion on the state of the Republican Party. A member of one of the most viral clip-generating committees in recent years, the House Judiciary Committee, Swalwell says attacks like Boebert’s are just the latest examples of Republicans’ “cruel” and “creepy” assaults on everyday Americans.
“I talked on the floor last night with colleagues who were just so uncomfortable with the direction that McCarthy’s MAGA Congress is going,” Swalwell said, while adding that he was most concerned by on-demand gender checks proposed by Republicans.
Eric Swalwell Says Kevin McCarthy's MAGA Team Is a Bunch of Creeps
https://www.thedailybeast.com/eric-swalwell-says-kevin-mccarthys-maga-team-is-a-bunch-of-creeps?ref=homeEric Swalwell Says Kevin McCarthy’s MAGA Team Is a Bunch of Creeps
THE NEW ABNORMAL
Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-CA) airs his views on the current state of Republican politics on this week’s episode of The New Abnormal.
The Daily Beast
Updated Sep. 29, 2023 3:16AM EDT / Published Sep. 29, 2023 12:59AM EDT
Colorado Rep. Lauren Boebert’s proposed amendment on Wednesday to reduce the salary of Shawn Skelly, the transgender Assistant Secretary of Defense for Readiness, to just $1, is proof that attacks on trans people are becoming more normalized.
That’s according to Congressman Eric Swalwell out of California’s 14th Congressional District, who joins The New Abnormal this week for a frank discussion on the state of the Republican Party. A member of one of the most viral clip-generating committees in recent years, the House Judiciary Committee, Swalwell says attacks like Boebert’s are just the latest examples of Republicans’ “cruel” and “creepy” assaults on everyday Americans.
“I talked on the floor last night with colleagues who were just so uncomfortable with the direction that McCarthy’s MAGA Congress is going,” Swalwell said, while adding that he was most concerned by on-demand gender checks proposed by Republicans.
“What Republicans want to do to trans kids is not only cruel, but it's creepy.”
“As a parent of a little girl, it is creepy to me that you would want to inspect their gender like that. That’s just creepy to me. And there’s no other place this goes with the legislation that you’re supporting than doing a gender check.”
“As a parent of a little girl, it is creepy to me that you would want to inspect their gender like that. That’s just creepy to me. And there’s no other place this goes with the legislation that you’re supporting than doing a gender check.”
September 28, 2023
Mick Jagger Hints Rolling Stones May Leave $500M Album Fortune to Charity to 'Do Some Good in the World'
People
Kimberlee Speakman
September 28, 2023 at 9:35 AM
The Rolling Stones are set to notch another album in their discography with the release of 'Hackney Diamonds' on Oct. 20
Mick Jagger is getting candid about the Rolling Stones’ legacy.
The “(I Can't Go) Satisfaction” singer, who is set to put out a new album with the band in October, said that while the Rolling Stones have no plans right now to sell their post-1971 catalog — which includes Black and Blue and Tattoo You — but have some ideas of what to do with it eventually.
In a new interview with WSJ Magazine, the 80-year-old rock legend said they could give the approximately half a billion dollars they would get from selling it to their heirs, but “the children don’t need $500 million to live well. Come on.”
So he said that “maybe” the money could go to charity instead. “You maybe do some good in the world,” added Jagger.
In the meantime, he and fellow bandmembers Keith Richards and Ronnie Wood are notching another album in their discography with their upcoming release called Hackney Diamonds, which is the band’s first album of original music in 18 years.
Mick Jagger Hints...Stones May Leave $500M Album Fortune to Charity to 'Do Some Good in the World
https://www.aol.com/lifestyle/mick-jagger-hints-rolling-stones-133500446.htmlMick Jagger Hints Rolling Stones May Leave $500M Album Fortune to Charity to 'Do Some Good in the World'
People
Kimberlee Speakman
September 28, 2023 at 9:35 AM
The Rolling Stones are set to notch another album in their discography with the release of 'Hackney Diamonds' on Oct. 20
Mick Jagger is getting candid about the Rolling Stones’ legacy.
The “(I Can't Go) Satisfaction” singer, who is set to put out a new album with the band in October, said that while the Rolling Stones have no plans right now to sell their post-1971 catalog — which includes Black and Blue and Tattoo You — but have some ideas of what to do with it eventually.
In a new interview with WSJ Magazine, the 80-year-old rock legend said they could give the approximately half a billion dollars they would get from selling it to their heirs, but “the children don’t need $500 million to live well. Come on.”
So he said that “maybe” the money could go to charity instead. “You maybe do some good in the world,” added Jagger.
In the meantime, he and fellow bandmembers Keith Richards and Ronnie Wood are notching another album in their discography with their upcoming release called Hackney Diamonds, which is the band’s first album of original music in 18 years.
September 27, 2023
'Feminist approach' to cancer could save lives of 800,000 women a year
‘Feminist approach’ to cancer could save lives of 800,000 women a year
Gender inequality and discrimination impede timely diagnoses and quality care for women around the world, says report
Andrew Gregory Health editor
@andrewgregory
Tue 26 Sep 2023 18.30 EDT
Last modified on Tue 26 Sep 2023 19.30 EDT
Health experts are calling for a “feminist approach” to cancer to eliminate inequalities, as research reveals 800,000 women worldwide are dying needlessly every year because they are denied optimal care.
Cancer is one of the biggest killers of women and ranks in their top three causes of premature deaths in almost every country on every continent.
But gender inequality and discrimination are reducing women’s opportunities to avoid cancer risks and impeding their ability to get a timely diagnosis and quality care, according to a report published in the Lancet.
The largest report of its kind, which studied women and cancer in 185 countries, found unequal power dynamics across society globally were having “resounding negative impacts” on how women experience cancer prevention and treatment.
There was particular focus on “women’s cancers” – including breast and cervical – despite lung and colorectal cancer being among the top three causes of deaths from the disease, researchers said.
more...
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2023/sep/26/feminist-approach-cancer-save-lives-800000-women
September 27, 2023
The rightwing group swamping US election offices with records requests
Local Labs – which calls its work both political research and journalism – is demanding voters’ details across the country to back claims of election fraud
Jen Fifield in Prescott, Arizona
Tue 26 Sep 2023 11.00 EDT
Last modified on Tue 26 Sep 2023 11.56 EDT
Votebeat is a non-profit news organization reporting on voting access and election administration across the US. Sign up for our free newsletters here.
In North Carolina, Local Labs wanted obscure voter records that would take weeks, or even months, to prepare. In Georgia, the company requested a copy of every envelope voters used to mail in their ballots. And in dozens of counties across the US, Local Labs asked for the address of every midterm voter.
Local election offices across the country are struggling to manage a sharp rise in the number of public records requests, and extensive requests coming from a little-known conservative effort called Local Labs in at least five states have stymied election officials, according to a Votebeat review of hundreds of records requests, as well as interviews. The requests are broad and unclear, and the purpose for obtaining the records is often not fully explained, leaving officials wondering in some cases whether they can legally release the records.
Local Labs is known for a vast network of websites that rely mainly on aggregation and automation, blasting out conservative-leaning hyper-local news under names such as the Old North News, in North Carolina, and Peach Tree Times, in Georgia.
Local Labs’ CEO, Brian Timpone, told Votebeat the company was using records requests in an attempt to expose election fraud that he is sure exists. The company was sometimes getting paid by GOP-backed clients to do so, Timpone acknowledged, characterizing the work simultaneously as both political research and journalism.
snip//
Veteran journalists and those who study journalism ethics say he’s wrong. The Arizona State University journalism professor Julia Wallace – previously the editor of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution – said doing reporting and paid-for work at the same time is not ethical. “That’s not independent, so that’s not journalism,” she said.
more...
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/sep/26/local-labs-election-voting-records-requests
The rightwing group swamping US election offices with records requests
The rightwing group swamping US election offices with records requests
Local Labs – which calls its work both political research and journalism – is demanding voters’ details across the country to back claims of election fraud
Jen Fifield in Prescott, Arizona
Tue 26 Sep 2023 11.00 EDT
Last modified on Tue 26 Sep 2023 11.56 EDT
Votebeat is a non-profit news organization reporting on voting access and election administration across the US. Sign up for our free newsletters here.
In North Carolina, Local Labs wanted obscure voter records that would take weeks, or even months, to prepare. In Georgia, the company requested a copy of every envelope voters used to mail in their ballots. And in dozens of counties across the US, Local Labs asked for the address of every midterm voter.
Local election offices across the country are struggling to manage a sharp rise in the number of public records requests, and extensive requests coming from a little-known conservative effort called Local Labs in at least five states have stymied election officials, according to a Votebeat review of hundreds of records requests, as well as interviews. The requests are broad and unclear, and the purpose for obtaining the records is often not fully explained, leaving officials wondering in some cases whether they can legally release the records.
Local Labs is known for a vast network of websites that rely mainly on aggregation and automation, blasting out conservative-leaning hyper-local news under names such as the Old North News, in North Carolina, and Peach Tree Times, in Georgia.
Local Labs’ CEO, Brian Timpone, told Votebeat the company was using records requests in an attempt to expose election fraud that he is sure exists. The company was sometimes getting paid by GOP-backed clients to do so, Timpone acknowledged, characterizing the work simultaneously as both political research and journalism.
snip//
Veteran journalists and those who study journalism ethics say he’s wrong. The Arizona State University journalism professor Julia Wallace – previously the editor of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution – said doing reporting and paid-for work at the same time is not ethical. “That’s not independent, so that’s not journalism,” she said.
more...
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/sep/26/local-labs-election-voting-records-requests
September 27, 2023
‘Feminist approach’ to cancer could save lives of 800,000 women a year
Gender inequality and discrimination impede timely diagnoses and quality care for women around the world, says report
Andrew Gregory Health editor
@andrewgregory
Tue 26 Sep 2023 18.30 EDT
Last modified on Tue 26 Sep 2023 19.30 EDT
Health experts are calling for a “feminist approach” to cancer to eliminate inequalities, as research reveals 800,000 women worldwide are dying needlessly every year because they are denied optimal care.
Cancer is one of the biggest killers of women and ranks in their top three causes of premature deaths in almost every country on every continent.
But gender inequality and discrimination are reducing women’s opportunities to avoid cancer risks and impeding their ability to get a timely diagnosis and quality care, according to a report published in the Lancet.
The largest report of its kind, which studied women and cancer in 185 countries, found unequal power dynamics across society globally were having “resounding negative impacts” on how women experience cancer prevention and treatment.
There was particular focus on “women’s cancers” – including breast and cervical – despite lung and colorectal cancer being among the top three causes of deaths from the disease, researchers said.
more...
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2023/sep/26/feminist-approach-cancer-save-lives-800000-women
'Feminist approach' to cancer could save lives of 800,000 women a year
‘Feminist approach’ to cancer could save lives of 800,000 women a year
Gender inequality and discrimination impede timely diagnoses and quality care for women around the world, says report
Andrew Gregory Health editor
@andrewgregory
Tue 26 Sep 2023 18.30 EDT
Last modified on Tue 26 Sep 2023 19.30 EDT
Health experts are calling for a “feminist approach” to cancer to eliminate inequalities, as research reveals 800,000 women worldwide are dying needlessly every year because they are denied optimal care.
Cancer is one of the biggest killers of women and ranks in their top three causes of premature deaths in almost every country on every continent.
But gender inequality and discrimination are reducing women’s opportunities to avoid cancer risks and impeding their ability to get a timely diagnosis and quality care, according to a report published in the Lancet.
The largest report of its kind, which studied women and cancer in 185 countries, found unequal power dynamics across society globally were having “resounding negative impacts” on how women experience cancer prevention and treatment.
There was particular focus on “women’s cancers” – including breast and cervical – despite lung and colorectal cancer being among the top three causes of deaths from the disease, researchers said.
more...
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2023/sep/26/feminist-approach-cancer-save-lives-800000-women
September 27, 2023
The beginning of the end of the Trump Org as we’ve known it?
Published by digby on September 26, 2023
https://twitter.com/Delavegalaw/status/1706774869281579191
Maybe they can reconstitute themselves in Russia.
digby: The beginning of the end of the Trump Org as we've known it?
https://digbysblog.net/2023/09/26/the-beginning-of-the-end-of-the-trump-org-as-weve-known-it/The beginning of the end of the Trump Org as we’ve known it?
Published by digby on September 26, 2023
https://twitter.com/Delavegalaw/status/1706774869281579191
Maybe they can reconstitute themselves in Russia.
September 25, 2023
A Few Thoughts on This Admission: I Am Old
by Douglas Penick | September 25, 2023 - 5:57am
Much to my surprise, I find that I’m now part of a large minority that is often ignored, frequently disdained, and regularly segregated.
I am old.
And indeed, it’s quite a shock to find that the world in which I worked, struggled, dreamed, and loved now regards me quite differently than it did only 10 years ago. Growing old, it seems, is a condition that Western post-industrial society and culture do not consider meaningful, useful, or even valid. And yet, the truth is, and this is also a surprise, that as we become old, we enter a time of life, even with its losses and deficits, that is not a defective version of youth or middle age, but is something quite different, with its own qualities, discoveries, and surprises.
“Ageism” is an attitude people inflict on themselves. Old people are what almost everyone will become. But somehow, this part of existence is treated as something that must be actively ignored, as if old age were an infectious disease transmitted by acknowledging it. Or a misfortune that can be averted by denying it. “You’re only as old as you think you are,” said my son recently. “Only young people think that,” I snapped. Contemplating dying and death is, it seems, more appealing than imagining being old.
snip//
We cannot escape the fact that old age is a time of loss. Old, we experience depletion in many parts of our lives. Our bodies and senses weaken, become unreliable in unforeseen ways, fall subject to illness, and require more attention simply to continue a reasonable level of function. More difficult is the loss of friends and family and the changes in the social institutions where we once had a place. Most difficult and certainly most frightening is the threat or actual loss of mental capacity. None of these occurrences are part of how we thought of ourselves or planned our future. As we age, our lives become strangely unrecognizable. We realize that life is no longer in our control. And old age ends only when we enter a terrain that is truly and completely unknown.
Thus, more than any other time in life, old age is the time of deepest and most pervasive uncertainty. The uncertainty regarding our financial sustainability is not the least of these, but somehow comes to epitomize the perilousness of our situation. How we will manage being ourselves, being in our world, is no longer obvious. So we feel the world moving away from us. We can no longer reach out and grasp and cling, control and shape what’s happening. Our future is no longer limitless. It is genuinely and utterly unknowable.
But as the world becomes perhaps more distant and out of our control, we begin to see patterns we had never imagined or only dimly sensed. Our world, our selves become less stable and less secure. Everything is more intensely transitory. Situations, objects, places, people become, moment by moment, very deeply to be cherished, valued; loved, not in spite of being impermanent, but because they and we are only together for this moment. Colors become more vivid, momentary smells, sudden sounds, temperatures and textures, memories, ideas, gestures appear, vanish, and only briefly detach themselves from the flow of sensoria. We take less and less for granted.
more...
http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/douglas-penick/107804/a-few-thoughts-on-this-admission-i-am-old
A Few Thoughts on This Admission: I Am Old
A Few Thoughts on This Admission: I Am Old
by Douglas Penick | September 25, 2023 - 5:57am
Much to my surprise, I find that I’m now part of a large minority that is often ignored, frequently disdained, and regularly segregated.
I am old.
And indeed, it’s quite a shock to find that the world in which I worked, struggled, dreamed, and loved now regards me quite differently than it did only 10 years ago. Growing old, it seems, is a condition that Western post-industrial society and culture do not consider meaningful, useful, or even valid. And yet, the truth is, and this is also a surprise, that as we become old, we enter a time of life, even with its losses and deficits, that is not a defective version of youth or middle age, but is something quite different, with its own qualities, discoveries, and surprises.
“Ageism” is an attitude people inflict on themselves. Old people are what almost everyone will become. But somehow, this part of existence is treated as something that must be actively ignored, as if old age were an infectious disease transmitted by acknowledging it. Or a misfortune that can be averted by denying it. “You’re only as old as you think you are,” said my son recently. “Only young people think that,” I snapped. Contemplating dying and death is, it seems, more appealing than imagining being old.
snip//
We cannot escape the fact that old age is a time of loss. Old, we experience depletion in many parts of our lives. Our bodies and senses weaken, become unreliable in unforeseen ways, fall subject to illness, and require more attention simply to continue a reasonable level of function. More difficult is the loss of friends and family and the changes in the social institutions where we once had a place. Most difficult and certainly most frightening is the threat or actual loss of mental capacity. None of these occurrences are part of how we thought of ourselves or planned our future. As we age, our lives become strangely unrecognizable. We realize that life is no longer in our control. And old age ends only when we enter a terrain that is truly and completely unknown.
Thus, more than any other time in life, old age is the time of deepest and most pervasive uncertainty. The uncertainty regarding our financial sustainability is not the least of these, but somehow comes to epitomize the perilousness of our situation. How we will manage being ourselves, being in our world, is no longer obvious. So we feel the world moving away from us. We can no longer reach out and grasp and cling, control and shape what’s happening. Our future is no longer limitless. It is genuinely and utterly unknowable.
But as the world becomes perhaps more distant and out of our control, we begin to see patterns we had never imagined or only dimly sensed. Our world, our selves become less stable and less secure. Everything is more intensely transitory. Situations, objects, places, people become, moment by moment, very deeply to be cherished, valued; loved, not in spite of being impermanent, but because they and we are only together for this moment. Colors become more vivid, momentary smells, sudden sounds, temperatures and textures, memories, ideas, gestures appear, vanish, and only briefly detach themselves from the flow of sensoria. We take less and less for granted.
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http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/douglas-penick/107804/a-few-thoughts-on-this-admission-i-am-old
