Approaching the Stone

In A Christmas Carol, the Ghost of Christmas Future brings Scrooge to a neglected graveyard, and points to an overgrown and untended grave. Scrooge is very frightened, and delivers in both the book and the great 1951 movie the same words-

"Spirit of the Future, I fear you more than any specter I have yet seen. Before I approach that stone, tell me- are these the shadows of things that Will be, or May be?"

This quote has had, over the years, enormous personal meaning to me. When I was diagnosed with polycystic disease in 1979, those words pointed to the inevitability of my early and ugly death. I was wrong, of course. 42 years later, through the blindingly magnificent gifts of two people, I am still alive. The words, however, still ring with fear and power, just of a different kind.

Like Scrooge, like all people and Peoples, we are making choices we believe are good and right. It is always smart to think about such choices, and more than usually so these days. In short, is what we are doing now good? Do our choices serve society and individuals?

The world I grew up in was one of unquestioned American superiority. More money, more resources, better ideas, more effort....America was simply bigger and better. It was part of how we saw ourselves and the world in 1960. Buy imported cars? Foreign-made electronics? Why? We made the best in the world. There was  one dominant image of America- a white one. Mayberry RFD, Father Knows Best, Davey and Goliath, Sound of Music, My Fair Lady....On and on the list of shows on television and Broadway runs that showed a white world.

This picture has been heavily criticized as not representative of America, and there is truth to that. The America of 1960 had all kinds of people in it- what we now call Asians, hispanics, blacks, Europeans of all stripes, Jews. Not one of these groups showed up in popular entertainment of the time. But those movies and plays showed something else, too- a polite and orderly America.

The America of 1960, of my childhood, was mannerly in public. Sure, behind closed doors there was, to paraphrase Arthur Miller,  sex, profanity, substance use, and violence.  In public, however, a man who cursed or told foul jokes in front of women and children would get chastised by other men. There were clear although unwritten expectations of what was considered good behavior and manners. Public life was circumscribed by consideration for the public at large. Parks were generally places where families could and did go, downtown streets places for public accommodation and convenience.  This was enforced by police with laws against vagrancy, loitering, littering, and disturbing the peace. 

Most of those laws have long since been declared unconstitutional. Minority advocacy groups loudly claim they were and are racist laws, simply because more blacks got arrested for these public order crimes. Laws governing zoning and preventing the opening of strip clubs, liquor stores, and other adult concessions were challenged as unconstitutional infringements on freedom of speech. That none of these activities constituted speech made no difference to the courts of the times. Stripping off your clothing was construed as speech. Preventing people from sleeping in parks was ruled an infringement on the right to use public spaces.  

Generally speaking, the considerations for the public and public places were subsumed by self-expression as the primary driver for public behavior .

We are now seeing further erosion of public order laws. The riots of last year were not stopped by curfews or mass arrests because they were construed as protests. The word 'peaceful' was stretched until its meaning disappeared. Throwing rocks and setting fire to buildings was lumped under the rubric of peaceful simply because no one was injured or killed. Well, maybe a couple, but that is now an acceptable cost to pay for freedom of assembly.

When police try to make an arrest, such as for an outstanding warrant in Minnesota, the subject resists and is shot. There have been public calls to let the suspect get away rather than use force. Black suspects use force far more often and to a much greater degree  than white suspects, but despite this, it is racist to use force to subdue them. In the name of 'equality' we are supposed to let go criminals and those violent toward the police. The meaning of equality has changed from equality of opportunity to equality of outcome. If outcomes differ by race or sex, then the process is racist or sexist.

In Seattle, San Francisco, and other west coast cities, public defecation is no longer prosecuted or even ticketed. Neither is public drug use or intoxication. The sidewalks of these cities are not just public conveyances, they are now bedroom and toilet facilities as well. Tent cities of homeless are so large that public clamor has finally forced their removal, only to have them appear elsewhere. The homeless and jobless make their way to Seattle specifically because of their lax law enforcement.

Our nation was founded by immigrants, the religious and ethnic cast-offs of other nations. They all came here legally. Legally. Ellis Island was not just a waiting room. Immigrants could be and were rejected by immigration authorities for illness, poor behavior, and deformities. There were quotas for which kind of immigrants were wanted (hint- white, northern European ones). There was no 'due process' for those rejected for immigration. Immigration officers had that authority.

We have decided illegal entry into our nation, rather than being a prima facie crime, needs a hearing before a judge. We have roughly a million illegal immigrants yearly into the US. There are between 12 and 15 million illegals in the US now. That's nearly 5% of our entire population. 

We mouth words about equality for women while we let confused men with fake boobs and hormones compete as women in sports, and they have won track and field, cycling, and weightlifting titles. The NCAA encourages this, again in the name of access and equality.

We once had the Hayes Commission rules governing content of movies and television. You can read their rules here. These rules broke down in the general loosening of social standards in the early 60s. What was once shocking and dramatic now looks incidental and tame. We have become accustomed to explicit violence, close-ups of hideous wounds, explicit sexual acts and images (oral sex in The Brown Bunny, a close-up of Eva Green's vulva in The Dreamers, and on and on and on). Exposure of breasts is so ubiquitous that Seth McFarland did the entire 2013 Oscars opening song on them- We Saw Your Boobs. 

What is most interesting about the video of that song are the close-ups of actresses as they are named for showing their breasts. One after another, they appear annoyed, angry, or embarrassed. Why? You did it; why aren't you proud of it? Everyone is so open-minded, so liberal, that things like marriage, parents, and sex don't matter. It's fine to be 90% naked on a beach, fine to be naked in a movie....That is, until you're called out for it. THEN you're ashamed?

It's fine to shit on the sidewalk, until people can't walk their any more because of human waste, tents, and alcoholics. It's a great idea to defund the police, until there is an marked upsurge in violent crime. The police are racist if they use force. Songs with the most explicit and degrading lyrics are 'freedom of expression' even as we  decry rape and sexual objectification of women. 

We should indeed be afraid of the future we have created. The stone the spirit points to is for our society. And like that grave, our society is untended and unbordered. In our promotion of freedom and equality we have completely forgotten decency, order, and manners. The Spirit of the Future did not point to my death, but is certainly has to the death of civil behavior and common sense.

I'm glad I'm old.....

Ted