Renaissance Guy (Mobile)

Facing Failure

I am in a particularly gloomy, dare I say, depressed, mood upon the eve of my writing this. Owing to the impending blizzard, United Nations Headquarters has been closed, and subsequently the events which I was to attend for the Women’s Empowerment Principles have been “postponed indefinitely”. The news reached me only minutes before I was to board the train which would have taken me into the city, where I had arranged for a hotel room overnight so as to avoid to having to travel during a blizzard.

This left me with an urgent choice: I could board the train, and spend a day trapped in a frozen city that was actively trying to dissuade people from traveling, or I could cut my losses, eat the cost of the hotel room, and return home to ride out the storm there. It probably surprises few that I chose the latter option; the option touted as the more sensible, strategically conservative, objectively correct option. Still, making this choice left me with a bitter taste in my mouth. It leaves me feeling as though I have failed.

I do not like failure.

Actually, that statement is inaccurate, or at least, misleading. I don’t merely dislike failure, in the same way that I dislike, say, sunscreen. No, I hate failure, in every sense of the word. I loathe it, detest it, and yes, I fear it.

This is not to say that I have such strong feelings toward losses. I feel this is an important distinction. Though I do have an adversity to unnecessary losses, sometimes, such sacrifices are necessary. What I hate is trying, making sacrifices, and then failing despite, or even worse, because of those efforts. The important distinction, at least in my mind, is that losses are a strategic principle, and a passing phenomenon, while failure is a state of being, whether for a few moments surrounding a particular exercise, or for a lifetime.

As one might expect, this makes me, in general, rather risk averse. Of course, this itself presents a paradox. Not taking a given risk also entails the inverse risk contained in the opportunity cost. That is to say, by not taking a given bet, you are effectively betting against it. This means that refusing to accept risks is always inherently itself a risk. So, for example, one cannot accept a zero percent chance of food poisoning without not eating altogether; and if one were to attempt to do so, they would quickly find themselves confronted by the more urgent problem of starvation.

The blizzard that closed the UN put me in a no-win situation. As a rational person, I can accept this, and act to cut my losses. Either I canceled my trip, resigned myself to staying at home, and ate the cost of my hotel reservations, or I purchased my train ticket, defied government instructions to stay home and avoid travel, put myself in danger, and spent the day trapped in a hotel room. I understand rationally why I chose as I did, and rationally, maintain that I made the correct decision. Yet I cannot escape the feeling that in choosing to abort my plans, I have failed my objective. Even if there was nothing to gain by getting on the train, I cannot suppress the feeling that my conscious choice invited some moral failing.

Some cursory research suggests that this particular feeling is not unique to myself, nor is it a new field of philosophical musings. Humans feel more emotional and moral responsibility for acts which are consciously undertaken than for merely following existing plans. This feeling is so prevalent it carries legal weight; binding contracts cannot be made by failing to decline an agreement; they require active assent. This might explain why I feel particularly upset with myself; If I had made no choice, then any perceived failure could only be an act of God, and out of my control. By making a conscious decision to cut my losses, I made that result a personal consequence, at least to my subconscious mind.

This leaves me at something of an impasse. I know why I am upset, yet can do little to console myself except to distract and reassure the nagging elements of my unconscious mind that I made the correct decision. I am left in conflict with myself, and left acutely aware of the fickleness of my own mind. While I suppose that this state of affairs is strictly preferable to feeling upset and not understanding why at all, I still cannot bring myself to feel in any meaningful way confident about myself in the present tense, particularly as these most recent reactions would seem to indicate that I might not be the single-mindedly rational being that I like to pretend that I am.

As I have indicated previously, I have very little intrinsic self confidence, at least in the manner which most people seem to expect that I ought. For whatever reason, I cannot seem to raise such self-evident feelings of self worth, and therefore, when I project such feelings, it is borne not of some internal passion, but extrinsic, statistical calculation. I base my self-assessment not on my own feelings, nor on others’ opinions, but on data and milestones. And though I feel that this generally gives me a better handle on the limits of my abilities, it also means that when I put my mind to a particular objective, and yet still fail for whatever reason, it becomes not only a momentary setback, but a point of evidence against my worth as a human being.

This can, and historically has, resulted in a mental loop whereby a temporary failure, such as a meeting which I had my aspirations set upon being cancelled by a snowstorm, leads to a general hardening of outlook, which in turn causes me to shift to the back foot, acting more conservatively, and taking fewer risky opportunities. Consequently, I wind up having fewer major victories to celebrate and reassure myself, and am instead left to reflect upon all of the opportunities which I missed. Because I was led to skip these choices by seemingly rational means, I cannot regret individual choices, but rather categorize them as mere symptoms of a general moral failing. These reflections promote further self-doubt, further strategic conservatism, and so on.

So, what can I do about it?

With the help of family and friends, I have come to realize that this is a viscous cycle that represents many of the worst and most self-destructive aspects of my personality and manner of thought. Of course, recognizing this fact consciously is the easy part. Hindsight is perfect, after all. The hard part is determining how to counter this cycle.

Historically my solution to such problems has been to throw myself into work, especially school work. This serves a dual purpose. First, if I am working hard enough, I do not have the time nor the energy to stew over my situation in more general terms. Second, it gives me a sense that I am accomplishing something. From primary through early high school, this approach has generally worked.

However, more recently, as the school has continued to demonstrate its gross incompetence in accommodating my physical disabilities, and as they have become increasingly distraught over the fact that my disability has not healed itself by magic, it has apparently occurred to the school administration that the correct way to inspire me to overcome medical impossibilities is to continually evoke shame each time my medical issues cause me to miss a deadline. Exactly what they aim to accomplish through this pestering continues to elude me. But in any case, this state of affairs means that greater effort on my part is more often scolded than rewarded. For, it seems, every time I attempt to reach out for clarification and assistance, I am subjected to a lecture on “personal responsibility”.

Because the school administration is apparently so “forward thinking”, and therefore does not believe in disability whatsoever, I am told that the fault for my failures is not, cannot, lie in my disability, but only in my personal moral failings. I am told by special education professionals that if I were truly dedicated to my academic performance, that my chronic diseases ought not have any impact on my life whatsoever. My promises that I will do my utmost given what I have to work with fall on deaf ears, because, allegedly, if I were to truly do my utmost, I would already be done on my own.

Needless to say, this experience is extremely stressful, and only deepens my sense of failure, self-hatred and anxiety. It should surprise no one that I am not terribly productive under such conditions, which only exacerbates the problem. Thus it comes to pass that throwing myself into schoolwork and attempting to prove myself wrong; to prove that I can indeed overcome opposition and be successful, only leads to more evidence that I am a failure.

I have looked, and am still looking, into various strategies to deal with this cycle moving forward. One strategy has been to write, and to post here. Another has been to give myself permission to engage in short “micro-vacations” as I call them, or “sanity-breaks” as my doctors refer to them. These short periods can last anywhere from a few hours to a few days depending on the severity of my initial state, particularly as they tend to coincide with when I am most physically fatigued*, but the important part is that they remain constrained to a specific time instead of drawing out into a general malaise. During this time, I temporarily do away with all pretense of productivity, and allow myself to engage in whatever petty amusement strikes my fancy.

*Sidenote: the overlap between physiological issues and mental symptoms is a recurring theme, making meaningful treatment for both all the more challenging. After all, is it really paranoia if your statistical chances of dying are vastly increased? The consensus thus far is that it isn’t. This is the reason why, despite having all of the symptoms, I do not technically qualify for any mental health diagnosis; because in my case, the source is obvious and completely justified.

In this respect, the fact that the same blizzard which set me on this spiral also shut down most everything in the vicinity comprises a silver lining of sorts. Obviously, there is no magic bullet for irrational feelings of failure. But perhaps that is beside the point. Perhaps the point of overcoming this feeling is not to wind up standing triumphantly atop the pile of slain emotions, but to reach a peaceful stalemate. I do not necessarily need to feel good about the fact that I could not accomplish my goals; merely be able to accept it without it destroying myself. Perhaps it might be enough to be able to calmly analyze and discuss my thoughts in writing, without necessarily having to reach a decisive conclusion.

Reflections on International Women’s Day

I stated previously that I intended to bring this blog offline once again in solidarity with the Day Without Women Strike for International Women’s Day on March 8th. Two things have convinced me to alter my plans slightly. First, the strike organizers seem to be calling for only women to actually strike today, and are encouraging men to participate in other ways. This is fair enough. After all, it’s not my voice being put down, and I would have a hard time coming up with a tangible example of a time that gender discrimination has impacted me directly (It impacts me indirectly all the time, by holding back scientific progress by the selective suppression of certain groups’ advancement, but I digress).

Second, and arguably more important, is the point that, while striking and industrial action may be effective means of grabbing headlines, the point of these exercises is not to elicit silence, but conversation. Given that people seem to have this notion that I am a moderately talented communicator, and have chosen to listen to me, it stands to reason that a more appropriate response might be to attempt to add to the conversation myself.

It’s easy not to notice something that doesn’t affect oneself directly. Humans, it seems, possess an extraordinary talent for ignoring things that they feel do not concern them, particularly where knowledge of those things would make their lives and understanding of how the world works more complicated. This is probably a good thing on the whole, as it allows us to get through the day without having an existential crisis over the impending heat death of the universe, and feeling continually depressed about the state of affairs for our fellow humans in the developing world. On the other hand, it also makes it distressingly easy for us to overlook challenges to others when they do not have a direct impact on us.

Recently, I was invited to attend an event regarding the ongoing development and implementation of the Women’s Empowerment Principles at the United Nations. Now, as much as I like to believe that I am a progressive person capable of and inclined to provide and advocate for equal opportunity, it is impossible to deny the simple fact that I am male. And while I can name all kinds of discrimination that I have myself encountered, none of them relate to my sexual and gender identity. And so when it comes to suggesting ways to remedy present injustices, I do not really have a solid background to draw from.

I probably could have gotten away with what I already know. After all, with my limited experience in educating others on specific issues, and with my commitment to the principles of equality in general, surely I have enough context to be able to, if not contribute on my own, then at least, to pay homage to the general notion of women’s struggles?

Perhaps. But, I know enough people whom I respect, for whom this is a serious issue worthy of dedicating entire careers to. Additionally, I like to make a point to be an informed interlocutor. It is my firm position that all opinions worthy of serious discussion ought to have a firm factual and logical backing. And given that, in this case unlike most others, I do not have a personal background experience to draw upon, it seems only correct that I do my due diligence research so that I may make responsible and informed conclusions.

Thus, it transpired that I set myself the goal of becoming, if not an expert, then at least competent, in the field of gender relations and sexual inequality around the world in the space of just over two weeks. A lofty goal, to be sure, but a worthy one. My reading list included an assortment of United Nations, governmental and NGO reports, various statistical analyses, news stories, and a few proper books. Actually, calling it a reading list is a tad misleading, as, in order to cram as much information into as short a time as possible, most of the material in question was consumed in audio format, played at double or triple speed. This is a very effective way of gleaning the key facts without having to waste time on wasteful frivolities like enjoying the plot.

Most of my initial digging started in various UN organizations, chiefly the media center of the World Health Organization. While not always as in depth as respective national organizations, the WHO is useful inasmuch as it provides decent cursory summaries for the global perspective. What was most fascinating to me was that there were surprisingly few hard statistics. The biggest problem listed, particularly in the developing world, was not that women received a necessarily lower quality of healthcare, but that most did not receive health care at all, and therefore properly compiled statistics on gender discrepancies in health were notoriously hard to come by. Rather than telling a story, the data simply does not exist.

In a bitter irony, the more likely data was to exist for a specific region, the less likely significant gender discrepancies were to be shown to exist, at least in healthcare. That is to say that by the time that rigorous evidence could be compiled, the worst elements of inequality had been subdued. This makes a kind of sense. After all, if the problem is that women aren’t being allowed to participate in public, how exactly are you going to survey them? This also hinted at a theme that would continue to crop up: different regions and cultures are starting at tackling gender inequality from radically different starting points, and face accordingly different challenges.

My second major revelation came while listening to I Am Malala. For those who may have been living under a rock during that timeframe, here is the background: In 2012, Malala Yousefzai, a human rights and women’s education activist in rural Pakistan was shot by the taliban, sparking international outrage and renewed interest in the plight of women in the Middle East. Malala survived after being airlifted to the United Kingdom, and has since garnered celebrity status, becoming a goodwill ambassador for the United Nations’ women’s empowerment initiatives.

I have still not yet made up my mind on whether I will go so far as to say that I liked the book. I do not know that is the sort of book that is meant to be liked. I did, however, find it quite enlightening. The book is a first person biography; a kind of story that I have never been quite as interested in as the classic anecdote. If I am completely honest, I found most of the beginning rather dry. The story felt to me as though it had grown rather repetitive: Malala would have some dream or ambition that would seem fairly modest to those of us living in the developed world, which would naturally be made extremely contentious and difficult because she was a girl living in her particular culture.

It got a the point where I could practically narrate alongside the audiobook. And then, halfway through the twelfth or so incident where Malala came up short owing to her gender and her culture, it hit me: that’s the whole point. Yes, it is tedious, to the point of being frustrating to the narrative. That’s the point here. No part of this book would have happened, if not for the constant, grating frustration of sexist attitudes and policies. The story couldn’t progress because of those obstacles, and every time it seemed like one hurdle had been surmounted, another one cropped up. Because that’s what it’s like. And if I, the reader, was frustrated trying to hear the story, just imagine what it would be like to deal with the real deal.

A second revelation also occurred to me. In trying to tell of my tribulations in living with physical disabilities, I have often been accused of overstating the scope of their impact, to the point of copping blame for stirring up unnecessary trouble. People believed, or at least, suspected, that while life might be more difficult in a few select areas, surely it couldn’t effect absolutely everything in the way that I suggested it did. Perhaps, then, the problem lay not with the actual task at hand, but in the fact that my perception had been tainted. Perhaps I was not truly as disabled as I claimed, but merely suffered from a sort of persecution complex. I realized that I had unintentionally, unconsciously, made the same mistake in my reading of Malala’s story.

This also helped to answer another important question: In the developed world, we often hear bickering over to what degree we still “need” the women’s empowerment movement. After all, we have full suffrage, and equality before the law. Discrimination on the matter of sex is illegal, if it can be proven. Given how much better life is for women in the developed world than the developing, is it reasonable to expect more? Are these western advocates simply suffering from a persecution complex? Certainly there are those whose concerns are more immediately applicable and actionable than others, and certainly there are those who will insist no matter how much is done, that it isn’t enough. Such is the nature of politics, and on this the women’s empowerment movement in the developed world is not any different from any other political movement. But on the general question over whether genuine, actionable, inequities exist, it seems now far less unreasonable to me to accept that there may yet be more work to be done than I might have initially been led to believe.

I expect that even this conclusion will be contentious. I expect that I shall be told in short order that I have drawn conclusions from the data which I have aggregated which are faulty, or else that the data itself is biased or misleading. On this point I concede that I am still quite young in my in-depth study of this particular field, and, as mentioned previously, far better minds than mine have devoted entire careers to ironing out the finer points. Reasonable minds may, and indeed do, disagree about specifics. However, if there is one thing which my cursory research and analysis thereof has confirmed in my mind, it is that, on matters of general policy, I would rather err on the side of empathy, choosing rather to be too trusting in the good faith of others, than to ignore and unintentionally oppress.

It follows, then, that I should find myself wholeheartedly endorsing and supporting the observation and celebration of today, International Women’s Day, and reaffirming my support for continuation and expansion of the UN’s Women’s Empowerment Principles.

Pyrrhic Pizza and NerdCon: Nerdfighteria

I am never quite sure what to expect when going to NerdCon, and I am always surprised. The abundance of inside jokes and references is a high entry barrier to most. Even I, who am as well versed in the popular subculture as any, still find many things that are utterly incomprehensible to me.

There is also something distinctly paradoxical about NerdCon. Allow me to elaborate. The stated purpose of this event is a celebration of the community which has made its mark by combining the constructive spontaneity of the Internet with the mild antisocial tendencies of nerdiness. Contrast this with the strictly planned, hierarchically organized nature of commercial conventions. The idea of NerdCon is a celebration of and party for introverts and the socially inept. It is an oxymoron.

The brothers Green repeatedly stated that they believed that all they had done was to set a date and location, and that we, the attendees, had made it an event. Of course, they said this from atop a massive stage, with spotlights and cameras trained on them. It was strange, and thought provoking. Yet even more strange and thought provoking was seeing these people who I recognized from the internet and television in front of and around me, not as polished symbols, but as ordinary human beings.

The night of the concert series, I managed to meet up with some people whom I had previously chatted with online. It was strange to think that they, like myself, had come from faraway locales in order to attend this event, with minimal expectations; and had congregated together to meet each other people whom they only knew based on sparse text-based interactions. We were all immediately friends, even though none of us had ever met. I was continuously self-conscious of this, since I have never had much luck with friendship. It seemed, however, that all the little details which I had anxiously obsessed over were ultimately far less important than the simple fact that I was here. We were all here, together, all else be damned.

That evening before the concert, we elected to go out for food together. Our first choice was the Cheesecake Factory attached to the shopping center connected to the convention center. We were dismayed to discover that the wait was longer than we had until the concert. After we idled around for some moments, unsure of what to do next, a man who worked at the shopping center suggested an alternative. We set out, exiting the mall and heading out into the warm rain of downtown Boston towards where we had been assured that there would be restaurants with a far shorter wait time.

The first eatery we saw which would accommodate our group was a Pizzeria Uno’s. Four out of six of us were wearing our Pizza John t-shirts, we took this as a good omen, and went in. The wait to be seated, we were told, was no shorter than that of the Cheesecake Factory. At this point, two members of our group opted to split off and head back, reckoning that if a long wait was going to be necessary in any case, that they may as well go with their first choice, and also hoping that a smaller table might be more forthcoming. The larger portion of our group inquired as the possibility of a to go order.

We were told, at first, that it would be no more than fifteen minutes. After a brief conference, we elected for a single large cheese pizza. I gave my name, and we settled in for what we expected would be a short wait.

What was fascinating about this time estimate was that it seemed to remain constant regardless of our wait. That is to say, the estimate remained precisely fifteen minutes at the time we ordered, then ten minutes later, then twenty minutes after that. In the same way that a cure for all major illness has remained ten years away for the last four decades, it seemed that our Pizza would forever be fifteen minutes from completion.

At the forty minute mark, I began to despair. It wasn’t that I was exceptionally invested in the our pizza. I hadn’t yet paid for it, and so I had nothing truly to lose. There was the matter of my medically necessitated diet, which was fairly unambiguous on the fact that I would have to eat something, but this was still of secondary concern, even though it was probably the largest actual threat at the time.

Much as I enjoy traveling when I am able, my medical situation means that I am primarily a homebody. On an average day, I interact with the same four or five people (all family and tutors) and cover an area of approximately one hundred square meters. I write approximately four thousand words (average is about one thousand) and speak about three thousand (average is about sixteen thousand), owing mainly to a complete lack of social interaction. All of my friends are either away at university, or off working in the mythical “real world”, while I am left to contend with making the square peg of my medical situation fit into the round hole of my public high school’s graduation requirements.

Being acutely aware of my own isolation and corresponding utter lack of social experience, my greatest concern during the pizza debacle was that it might negatively color the impression of me of these people whom I so desperately wanted to call my friends. I feared that because I had been the person to actually place the order and put down my name, that this resulting fiasco would be my own shame. I feared, and indeed, expected, the immediate and harsh reproach of my comrades for this unmitigated failure to provide.

The scolding never came. The pizza eventually came. I paid at once, leaving a meager tip which I considered quite merciful given the extreme wait. I kept waiting the criticism which I fully expected. I waited to be torn into. Instead, the others tore into the pizza, anxiously attempting to scarf down an appropriate number of carbohydrates in the ten minutes remaining before the concert began. There were smiles all around. The pizza was good, if late. The only complaints were against the restaurant, not myself. The others were eager to give me cash for their share, and we made it to the concert on time.

At the concert series, Jon Cozart performed his piece “YouTube Culture” decrying the personality-cult nature of many modern online communities. The image of an internet celebrity as himself making bank on a song decrying such structures seemed both startlingly ironic, and completely apropos, given my earlier thoughts on the paradoxical nature of NerdCon itself.

There was a pervasive feeling, at least among myself and those with whom I interacted, that we were experiencing something special. It was a feeling as though, by reaching a critical mass of interesting, intelligent, and thoughtful people, we had ignited some sort of chain reaction. There was optimism in a way that I haven’t really felt since the new year, and I was reminded of the great World’s Fairs of yesteryear, when the planet’s great minds would all congregate and unveil their collective vision for the future.

There were sad moments as well, such as when John Green brought up the late Esther Earl in his speech, and was compelled to leave the stage because he broke down crying. There were reminders that they were many who had wanted to but could not attend for one reason or another. But even these were tempered by optimism and hope. Esther, we were told, received joy in her final days from gatherings of friends such as this, and those who could not attend were present in spirit, aided by live commentary and occasional streaming from us. The tone was overwhelmingly positive.

The last time I attended NerdCon (NerdCon: Stories in 2016), it turned out to be an inspiration for me, in part spurring the creation of this very blog. I do not yet know what the result of this year’s attendance will be, but I can state categorically that I left with a far better feeling about the world than when I arrived, which, I believe, makes this year’s attendance a victory.

Open Letter: Betsy DeVos

Today at school there was an informational session regarding the policies of the new department of education, and a letter-writing session to the new secretary of education. Unfortunately, in a bitter and illuminating irony, I was prevented from attending and participating owing to a flare-up of my disability. I have therefore resolved to make my point via online open letter.

Madam Secretary,

If I am completely honest, I hold reservations that you are qualified to hold your current post. Your lack of experience with public schools at all is disturbing; and your characterization of education as an industry rather than the duty of the government in protecting the inalienable right of the citizens in accordance with both international law and domestic precedent, is alarming.

With that said, I shall invite you to prove me wrong. I remain open to the possibility that I have underestimated your abilities and convictions, and those of your cabinet colleagues. In particular, your short-lived, halfhearted attempt to prevent the rollback of existing protections for transgender students is quite heartening, despite its failure. However, I should have to inform you that merely paying lip service to the idea of equal protection is not nearly enough, particularly for one who has sworn an oath to uphold it.

Because I do not expect much in the way of expanded services from your office, the main point of your tenure will be to ensure that existing protections for minorities and those such as myself with disabilities are enforced. Your job is to stand up for those who cannot stand for themselves. This is an enormous responsibility, and one that is arguably more critical to the continuing function of our democratic society than the jobs of your other colleagues.

I will hasten to point out, since the papers have brought it to my attention, that the primary motivation for your backing down during the standoff over transgender protections owed to your job security, that your position is most likely more secure than you may be led to believe. Yours is a senate-confirmed position. You, who were evidently the most qualified candidate the president could muster, only barely made it through senate approval. I do not expect the same senators would take kindly to you being asked to resign over adhering to your legally-mandated duty. I urge you to point out this matter to your colleagues the next time you feel pressured to compromise on principles.

In closing, I urge you, Madam Secretary, to prove me wrong; to demonstrate that you are qualified to uphold your constitutional and legal obligations. Prove that you are willing to put moral principles before money and politics. Give me reason to believe, as you put it during your confirmation hearings, that you “fully embrace equality [and] believe in the innate value of every single human being, and that all students, no matter their age, should be able to attend a school and feel safe and be free from discrimination.” Prove that you will stand by your words and enforce the civil rights legislation that ensures that our society can yet function.

Sincerely,
The Renaissance Guy
Registered independent voter, Blogger, and Student

Nailing the Colors

“Throw your soldiers into positions whence there is no escape, and they will prefer death to flight” – Sun Tzu, The Art of War.

Pardon the French

I often find that the hardest part of traveling for me is making the actual decision to commit to traveling. I mean, actually getting places is hard too, doubly so if I have to go through some kind of screening, seeing as how my medical devices, being both electronic and attached to me, set off alarms at every checkpoint, but over the years I’ve grown used to this.

The hardest part of traveling is determining whether this particular event is worth putting my metaphorical money where my mouth is. Not because money, or even travel time, are acutely scarce in my case, but rather because travel, especially in my case, requires a great deal of planning, and entails a considerable health risk.

The trouble with galavanting across the globe lies in the basic physiological fact that my body, unlike most, is not medically self sufficient. Simple sustenance is not enough for me to stave off death; I require a constant and complex life support regime to travel with me, with replacement and backup parts. Certain aspects of this baggage must be refrigerated, all of it requires special hazmat disposal, and from time to time, I still need to cease my activities in order to plug my cyborg components into a wall socket.

In addition to all of this routine hassle, I also must remain vigilant about the very real possibility of a more acute crisis. With increased activity and exposure to heretofore unknown pathogens comes an increased risk of medical catastrophe. And being far from my home and those doctors that are most familiar with my unique conditions amplifies the likelihood that, if something does go wrong, it will become critical.

I am a person who tends to overthink. I like to have the complete information before making a decision, and I like to take my time in doing so. When faced with uncertainty, I am broadly inclined to hedge my bets. A lifetime of chronic illness has taught me great appreciation for the value of playing one’s cards conservatively. This is, after all, the nature of medicine. Err on the side of caution. Prevent rather than cure. Rest, recuperate, and live to fight another day.

Yet this mindset is rather incongruous with modern travel. Traveling requires visas, reservations, tickets, invitations, and scheduling, all of which require commitment. One has to be able and willing to certify that they will be in a certain place on a certain day for a certain purpose, regardless of whatever extenuating circumstances may crop up between now and then. There is no option on airline bookings, or hotel reservations, to say “Yes, I will be there on February 24th with two other guests, unless of course one of us has a major health crisis or somesuch calamity.” Rather, it is “I will be there on February 24th with precisely two others, damn the torpedoes.”

This oversight seems to stem from the mistaken assumption that I have control over my life inasmuch as scheduling is concerned. That perhaps I was dealt a poor hand to begin with, but now that I have, it is solely my power to determine how I play my hand. This is absolutely not the case. I have no more control over the timing of my health problems than the average American does over the use of the US nuclear arsenal in an international crisis. That is to say, I can make my wishes known to the powers that be, and I can, on occasion, take indirect action to influence the overall outcome, but on the whole, my role is purely reactive.

In truth, I think this is part of what is so exhilarating to me about travel. Even in something as mundane as traveling across the state to visit friends, I am taking a gamble. I am nailing my colors to the mast, and committing to an offensive battle instead of waiting for my illness to strike first, and for me to react. Each one of these battles carries the distinct risk that it may be my last, and so I must choose my battles carefully.

With this in mind, I have decided to commit to making an appearance at NerdCon: Nerdfighteria in Boston this weekend. I plan to make myself identifiable with an oversized button of the compass-and-pencil seal. If my recently acquired and as yet untested means of button production work as envisioned, I will have some quantity of such buttons to distribute. In other words, come and say hi!

Strike!

Update: Scroll to the bottom of the post for the latest.

This blog ~~is currently participating~~ successfully participated in the nationwide general strike in protest of the United States government’s actions against refugees and immigrants. Access to our archives ~~has been~~ was temporarily suspended and has since been restored.

We do not apologize for this inconvenience.

All complaints should be directed to the United States government.

Update:

The day is over, and access to our archives has been restored. The Day Without Immigrants strike made headlines nationwide, and shut down a good portion of my local area. It is heartening to see people participating in collective action in meatspace in addition to online action.

Perhpas surprisingly, the hit counter actually reached a record since launch over the past 24 hours. I’m not quite sure what to make of this. We received a great deal of positive feedback during this time, which is much appreciated.

The biggest complaint of this strike, aside from those disagreeing with the cause, and the idea of collective action in general, was that it was poorly organized, poorly publicized, and done on short notice. In a sense, this is good news. It demonstrated the ability for quick reaction, and provides feedback for future action; most notably, the planned general strike for International Women’s Day on March 8th.

There have been talks of further strike action on Friday and continuing into the weekend. I applaud this effort, although I fear that attempting to extend this largely spontaneous effort will overtax the limited economic resources and political will of those who are perhaps sympathetic, but not necessarily committed enough to risk their livelihoods. Better in this case, I believe, to play the long game.

One more thing; amid all the demonstrations and media coverage, the super-PAC behind the presidential administrations quietly released a “Media Accountability Survey”. The questions are, of course, horribly biased, and it seems reasonable to assume that this will result in an accordingly biased result. Therefore, there has been an effort by some social media circles to spread publicity of the survey to ensure that it receives a wide sample size. For those interested, the link is below.

https://action.donaldjtrump.com/mainstream-media-accountability-survey/

Statistically Significant

Having my own website (something I can only now scarcely say without adding exclamation points,) has unlocked a great deal of new tools to explore. Specifically, having an operational content platform has given me access to statistics on who is reading what, who is clicking on given buttons, and where people are coming here from. It is enthralling, and terribly addictive.

Here are some initial conclusions from the statistics page:

1) There is a weak positive correlation between the days I release new content and the days we get more views. This correlation is enhanced if we stretch the definition of “day” to include proceeding twenty-four hours, rather than the remainder of the calendar day on which the content was released. This suggests that there may, in fact, be people actually reading what I write here. How exciting!

2) Most visitors register as originating from the United States. However, the script which tracks where our referrals come from paints a far more diverse picture. This could be a bug in the monitoring software, or people accessing the site from overseas could be using proxies to hide their identities.

3) The viewership of this blog is becoming larger and more international as a function of time.

4) More referrals currently come from personal one-on-one sharing (Facebook, web forums, shared links) than stumble-upon searches.

5) Constantly interrupting one’s routine to check website statistics will quickly drive on stark raving mad, as well as suck time away from writing.

These are interesting insights, and worthy of understanding for future posts. Of course, the immediate follow-up question is: What do I do with this data? How do I leverage it into more views, more engagement, and more shares? How do I convert these insights into money of fame or prestige? The idea seems to be that if a thing is being shared, there has to be some value coming back for the sharer aside from simply contributing to public discourse.

While I will not deny that I would enjoy having money, fame, and prestige, as of now, these are not my primary goals in maintaining this blog. If I do decide, as has been suggested, to follow the route of the professional sharer, soliciting donations and selling merchandise, it would not be in pursuit of Gatsbyesque money and status, but merely so that writing and not starving may not be mutually exclusive.

It is still strange to me that I have a platform. That, in the strictest sense, my writing here is a competitor of Netflix, JK Rowling, and YouTube. I am a creator. I am a website owner. I have a tendency to think of those aforementioned entities as being on a plane unto themselves, untouchable by mere mortals (or muggles, as the case may be) such as myself. And in business terms, there is some truth to this. But in terms of defining the meaning of “artist”, “creator” and “writer” in the twenty-first century, I am already on the same side of the line as them.

I suppose the heart of the matter is that, setting aside that those entities actually have professional salaries, there is no intrinsic difference between either of us. They have platforms, and I have a platform. They have an audience with certain demographics, as do I. They receive value from the distribution of their work, and I do for mine (albeit in different forms and on different orders of magnitude).

Growing up, I had this notion that adulthood conferred with it some sort of intrinsic superiority borne of moral and cognitive righteousness, and conferred upon each and every human upon reaching adulthood. I believed that the wealthy and famous had this same distinction one step above everyone else, and that those in positions of legal authority had this same distinction above all. Most of the authority figures in my life encouraged this mindset, as it legitimized their directions and orders to me.

The hardest part of growing up for me has been realizing that this mindset simply isn’t true; that adulthood is not a summary promotion by divine right, and that now that I too am a nominal adult, that no one else can truly claim to have an inherently better understanding of the world. Different minds of differing intellectual bents can come to differing conclusions, but people in power are not inherently right merely because they are in power.

I am not a better or worse human being merely because I happen to have the passwords and payment details to this domain, any more than Elon Musk is an inherently better human for having founded Tesla and Space-X. Yes, the two of us had resources, skills, and motivation to begin both of our projects, but this is as much a coincidental confluence of circumstances as a reflection on any actual prowess. Nor are we better people because we have our respective audiences.

In this day an age, there is much talk of division of people into categories. There are the creators and the consumers. The insiders and the outsiders. The elite and the commoners. The “world of success” as we have been taught to think about it, is a self-contained, closed-loop, open only to those who are worthy, and those of us who aren’t destined to be a part of it must inevitably yield to those who are. Except this plainly isn’t true. I’m not special because I have a blog, or even because I have an audience large enough to draw demographic information. There is nothing inherent that separates me from the average man, and nothing that separates both of us from those at the very top. To claim otherwise is not only dangerous to the idea of a democratic, free-market society, but is frankly a very childish way to look at the world.

You Have The Right To An Education

I am not sold on the going assumption seemingly embraced by the new US presidential administration which characterizes education as an industry, at least, not in the sense that the United States government has traditionally approached other industries. While I can appreciate that there may be a great deal which market competition can improve in the field, I feel it is dangerous to categorize education as merely an economic service rather than an essential civil service and government duty. Because if it is an industry, then it ceases to be a government duty.
The idea that education is a human right is not new, nor is it particularly contentious as human rights go. Article 26 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights reads in part as follows:

Everyone has the right to education. Education shall be free […] Technical and professional education shall be made generally available and higher education shall be equally accessible […] Education shall be directed to the full development of the human personality and to the strengthening of respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms. It shall promote understanding, tolerance and friendship among all nations, racial or religious groups, and shall further the activities of the United Nations for the maintenance of peace.

The United States lobbied strongly for the adoption and promotion of this declaration, and for many years touted it as one of the great distinctions which separated the “free world” from the Soviet Union and its allies. Americans were proud that their country could uphold the promise of free education. The United States remains bound to these promises under international law, but more importantly, is bound by the promise to its own citizens.

Of course, there are other, more nationalist grounds for opposing the erosion of the government’s responsibility to its citizens in this regard. Within the United States, it has long been established that, upon arrest, in order for due process to be observed, that a certain exchange must take place between the accused and the authorities. This exchange, known as the Miranda Warning, is well-documented in American crime shows.

The ubiquity of the Miranda Warning is not merely a coincidental procedure, but is in fact an enforced safeguard designed to protect the constitutional rights of the accused. Established in 1966 in the US Supreme Court Case Miranda vs. Arizona, the actual wording is less important than the notion that the accused must be made aware, and must indicate their understanding of, their constitutional rights regarding due process. Failure to do so, even for the most trivial of offenses, is a failure of the government to uphold those rights, and can constitute grounds for a mistrial.

The decision, then, establishes an important premise: Citizens who are not educated about their rights cannot reliably exercise them, and this failure of education represents sufficient legal grounds as to permit reasonable doubt on the execution of justice. It also establishes that this education is the duty of the government, and that a failure here represents an existential failure of that government. It follows, then, that the government and the government alone holds a duty to ensure that each citizen is at least so educated as to reasonably ensure that they can reliably exercise their constitutional rights.

What then, should we make about talk of turning education into a free-for-all “industry”? Can the government still claim that it is fulfilling its constitutional obligations if it is outsourcing them to third parties? Can that government still claim to be of and by the people if it’s essential functions are being overseen and administered by publicly unaccountable individuals? And what happens when one of these organizations fails to educate its students to a reasonable standard? Can the government be held accountable for the subsequent miscarriage of justice if the necessary measures to prevent it were undertaken in such a convolutedly outsourced manner as to make direct culpability meaningless?

As usual, I don’t know the answer, although I fear at our present rate, we may need to look at a newer, more comprehensive Miranda Warning.

Discovery, Ho!

I like the feeling of discovery. Being able to create new things is awesome, but it’s also great to find new things that other people have made. I enjoy the sense of exploration in learning about new phenomena and places. This joy of discovery is the main reason I love learning in general. Even when, for example, in the field of history, there is very little “new” to be discovered, there is still the possibility of unearthing a novel correlation or interpretation that can challenge the way we understand the world around us.

This week, my attention has fallen on the online scavenger hunt being arranged by John Green of Vlogbrothers (and many other things). The actual experience is very spoiler-heavy, and so I will do my best to avoid giving too much away for anyone who is interested on following through. The place to start is the Vlogbrothers YouTube channel. As of writing, the latest two of John’s videos (but not Hank’s, who allegedly, is just as clueless as the rest of us) are a part of the puzzle. There are plenty of hints in the comments section, but be warned, there are also spoilers.

The project is early enough that it’s not entirely clear what the endgame is here. There is much speculation, and circumstantial evidence to support it, that this whole charade is a build up to the release of a new book. Others have suggested that this is a fun side project to bring the community (known affectionately as “Nerdfighters”) closer together.

What is apparent so far is that the main nerve center appears to act as a sort of “virtual speakeasy” for dedicated followers, with the answers to the weekly riddles serving as passwords. This is a neat idea for a community as large as Nerdfighteria, as it acts as an effective barrier to spammers, trolls, and complete outsiders, while not being exclusionary to those who are genuinely interested.

Of course, debates over “spoiling” the passwords for others, particularly in the YouTube comments of the videos where the riddles are provided, have already sprung up, with strong arguments both for and against making it easier for others to find and gain access. Riddles have been criticized for being too region-specific. Current members are already looking to the future with dread as more and more Nerdfighters crack the puzzle and start pouring in.

More than anything, however, is a sense of excitement. Some are merely excited to have cracked the puzzles. Others are excited for the possible release of a new book, or else to determine where the remaining riddles, and the ongoing series of cryptic hints by John and his co-conspirators, lead. Still others, such as myself, are merely excited to be present. To take part in this massive story, wherever it leads, and to share it with like-minded community members.

The atmosphere is reminiscent of that of yesteryear’s NerdCon: Stories, arranged and attended by much the same group. Recounting that experience on this blog has been on my list, and given these new developments, will likely be moved up in my priorities. Suffice it to say, however, that the feeling is good, if somewhat strange. There are plenty of casual obscure references which I do not understand, and plenty more that I do. It is clear that, even this early, there is a solid sense of community, something which I find welcome and refreshing with all the talk of being divided going on in the world.

I do not know what will come next in this project. But I am excited to find out. In the meantime, Don’t Forget To Be Awesome.

Keeping Promises

I have just been informed of a setback to one of the research programs which I have had my eye on as a possible answer to my disability. The setback is not a natural discovery of some scientific obstacle, but rather a political hurdle put in place by the new American presidential administration.

A researcher who had been tapped to work in the United States on curing several deadly disease, including tuberculosis, rheumatoid arthritis, and Type 1 Diabetes, was denied boarding in Frankfurt on the grounds that she was an Iranian national [1][2].

What ever happened to “a big, fat beautiful door right in the middle of the wall” for the “good people” who “have recommendations from people”? This is, after all, the alleged basis for the new executive orders [3]. The researcher in question held a doctorate from the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, and was slated to work at Harvard on the personal recommendation of Dr. Soumya Raychaudhuri. Does this not sound like a good person wth recommendations?

This isn’t a question of how to process those who have come to the US illegally. This is someone whose visa was approved, who had even traveled to the US previously [1][2]. This is about America keeping its promises. Because if the United States government decides it can get away with breaking its word whenever it feels like it, how are foreign governments supposed to trust that the US will uphold its end of the bargain when, say, negotiating trade deals, or even security treaties? How are foreign leaders supposed to trust our dealmaker in chief when he decides to renegotiate all of current treaties? This is already in the minds of our European allies, who see this kind of promise-breaking as a destabilizing move [4].

Moreover, if the US government decides it can break its own rules when dealing with foreigners, what is to stop it from deciding it has to keep its promises to its own citizens? We don’t have to imagine an answer, because the State Department has already given us one, saying the dual citizens will be subject to the ban [5].

That is to say that American citizens who are of certain ancestry will not be permitted reentry to the country. This is, frankly, horrifying, and, perhaps ironically, makes me glad I have a second passport. Although I do not plan to leave the country over this latest debacle, I can now say with confidence which I would pick if forced to choose.

Works consulted:

1) Kliff, Sarah. ““But I have a valid visa:” An Iranian researcher barred from flying to US for new job.” Vox 28 Jan. 2017: n. pag. Web.

2) Gans, Felicia. “‘I told him I do have a valid visa, but he told me that it doesn’t matter.’.” Boston Globe. N.p., 29 Jan. 2017. Web. 29 Jan. 2017.
https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2017/01/28/told-him-have-valid-visa-but-told-that-doesn-matter/yttREc10s5cc7yjX3d48hJ/story.html

3) Johnson, Kevin R. “Trump’s ‘Big, Beautiful Door’ Is a Big, Beautiful Step in the Right Direction.” Time. N.p., 29 Oct. 2015. Web. 29 Jan. 2017. <http://time.com/4092571/republican-debate-immigration/>.

4) Smale, Alison. “European Leaders Reject Trump’s Refugee Ban as Violating Principle.” The New York Times. N.p., 29 Jan. 2017. Web. 29 Jan. 2017. <https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/29/world/europe/trump-executive-order-europe-merkel.html?_r=0>.

5) Jordan, Miriam, Ian Lovett, and Alejandro Lazo. “Donald Trump’s Immigration Order Sparks Confusion, Despair at Airports.” The Wall Street Journal. N.p., 29 Jan. 2017. Web. 29 Jan. 2017. <http://www.wsj.com/articles/donald-trumps-immigration-order-sparks-confusion-despair-at-airports-1485709114>.