Writer
Long time ago, before there was a blog and before there was ihath, in year 2002, people were talking about war on Afghanistan. News papers, news anchors, commentators and people were discussing the mechanics of war. I was walking around with a broken heart thinking of all the people in Afghanistan that will be killed, all the widows and orphans that will be created, families that will be displaced in a country that has already suffered so much. But in mass media land there seemed to be very little concern for Afghani life. As usual, if you are brown you don't matter in North American media. Your death is a mere statistic, not worth mentioning. As usual, I was feeling disgusted with the racist media coverage of the situation and the complete disregard for brown human life. There seemed to be a single exception to there rule, a single writer that mentioned concern for human life, all human life both brown and white in his weekly column. I started clipping his columns. I was showing these clippings to my friend Mordecai during yet another anti-war rally. "His writing is radical" I said as I was pointing out examples from the clippings. "How does he get away with it?" I remarked, considering that the publication was owned by CanWest the same media conglomerate that stifles a big portion of Canadian publications. "You have to write him a letter to express your appreciation" said Mordecai. "But, he is a serious writer, why would he care about what I think of him" was my reply. Mordecai shook his head and said assertively: "People like him get lots of hate mail, he might appreciate a positive letter of appreciation in return."
Two days later I sat down to write the first email I had written to a writer or a journalist. My intention was to write a brief email saying "I read your columns and I appreciate them", but I ended up writing a longer and a more emotional email. As I hit the send button I wondered if Geoff Olson the regular writer and cartoonist at the Vancouver Courier would even read it.
Few days later I sat down to read the next Geoff Olson article and received a shock to my system. The article was subtitled "Email from reader helps columnist maintain fire in the belly". The emotional article contains several quotes from my email and mentions my name towards the end.
As I read the article, my heart was pumping and I couldn't contain my excitement. It might seem silly to be so titilated by a mention in an article, but I felt in a state of euphoria for about 10 days afterwards. I clipped that article as well and added it to my collection.
I learned a lesson on the power of positive feedback.
Two days ago I opened an old notebook and found all the clippings I had collected. I was reflecting on all the things that had happened since. I had started a blog and received my own fair share of both hate email and positive email. I was thinking again about how the positive emails helped me continue writing even when I wanted to give up.
So today I wish to thank all the people that have bothered to send me encouraging emails over the years since I started this blog.
How has the times changed. During the Israeli war on Lebanon, the Vancouver Courier didn't even mention the war. If you read the publication during that time you would have thought there was no war at all in the world. Geoff Olson wrote about astrology and road rage and some other crucial subjects which no doubt somebody else is clipping but not me. I guess when you work for a CanWest publication the fire in the belly is allowed to last for only so long. I myself during that time didn't find the strength to write anything because all I could think of saying was "I feel so depressed, this is so depressing, I hate the world". Non of it seemed very useful or constructive and so I chose not to write at all.
Two days later I sat down to write the first email I had written to a writer or a journalist. My intention was to write a brief email saying "I read your columns and I appreciate them", but I ended up writing a longer and a more emotional email. As I hit the send button I wondered if Geoff Olson the regular writer and cartoonist at the Vancouver Courier would even read it.
Few days later I sat down to read the next Geoff Olson article and received a shock to my system. The article was subtitled "Email from reader helps columnist maintain fire in the belly". The emotional article contains several quotes from my email and mentions my name towards the end.
As I read the article, my heart was pumping and I couldn't contain my excitement. It might seem silly to be so titilated by a mention in an article, but I felt in a state of euphoria for about 10 days afterwards. I clipped that article as well and added it to my collection.
I learned a lesson on the power of positive feedback.
Two days ago I opened an old notebook and found all the clippings I had collected. I was reflecting on all the things that had happened since. I had started a blog and received my own fair share of both hate email and positive email. I was thinking again about how the positive emails helped me continue writing even when I wanted to give up.
So today I wish to thank all the people that have bothered to send me encouraging emails over the years since I started this blog.
How has the times changed. During the Israeli war on Lebanon, the Vancouver Courier didn't even mention the war. If you read the publication during that time you would have thought there was no war at all in the world. Geoff Olson wrote about astrology and road rage and some other crucial subjects which no doubt somebody else is clipping but not me. I guess when you work for a CanWest publication the fire in the belly is allowed to last for only so long. I myself during that time didn't find the strength to write anything because all I could think of saying was "I feel so depressed, this is so depressing, I hate the world". Non of it seemed very useful or constructive and so I chose not to write at all.
There is a way between voice and presence where information flows.
In disciplined silence it opens.
With wandering talk it closes. .... Rumi
2:37 PMI read a slew of Geoff's opinion articles as a result of your post. I now have an excruciating headache.
2:41 PM
Anglo,
Now you need to go over his cartoons. He is a cartoonist as well. I like this one of the pope
(http://www.vancourier.com/issues06/095106/opinion.html)
Have a cup of coffee in the Rosario coffee cup afterwards and it will help with the headache
:-)
8:26 AM
The Rosario cup is not a “coffee cup.” It is a Tsingtao beer mug. I only wish that it came in a pint size; that’s roughly a half liter for you sophisticated, modern metric system using “cultures”. :)
I probably should stop here with my comment, but good judgment and restraint are not matters that I exercise very well on the weekend, especially this weekend when I am heading to Ann Arbor for the UM-MSU game.
One of my “problems” which I have sort of resolved over the years is that I tend to take things too seriously. When I was in first or second grade and learning to read we had reading assignments as well as pleasure reading. I selected only non-fiction books, as I reasoned at that early age that there was no point in reading about something that was not true. Seriously, this is how I thought, until I discovered science fiction – Isaac Asimov in particular- probably in junior high school.
So it was with the Pope’s recent speech. I read the news media accounts, was more than a little disturbed, and went online to read the speech. Now, as a Protestant, I have no obligation to the Pope, and it is quite easy for me to find things to criticize given my Protestant perspective. In fact, I have an uncle who would ask at the Thanksgiving table, “Who wants the Pope’s nose?” That uncle was referring to the bird’s tail, a fatty, delicious treat for us Germanic peoples, and he always said it with big satisfied smile, thinking he was being humorous while at the same time speaking a profound truth.
I read the speech, given at a university and reflecting back on his days teaching there. I was surprised to discover that the Pope is an intellectual and that the speech was on a topic which was very interesting to me: the role of reason in faith and its corollary, the role or place of faith in applied reason e.g. science. This is no light topic for those who believe, but I would think that it would also be of interest to those who do not believe, just as fiction is now of interest to me for the truth it reveals amid the imaginary circumstances presented.
In the context of the Pope’s speech, at the point where he is discussing competing views: on the one hand the notion that acting unreasonably is contrary to God’s nature, and on the other hand, that God’s nature is not limited by anything, including reason, I personally think that the example of conversion by the sword is appropriate as well as instructional. Here is the offensive quote, at least as near as I can tell.
In the seventh conversation ("diálesis" -- controversy) edited by professor Khoury, the emperor touches on the theme of the jihad (holy war). The emperor must have known that sura 2:256 reads: "There is no compulsion in religion." It is one of the suras of the early period, when Mohammed was still powerless and under [threat]. But naturally the emperor also knew the instructions, developed later and recorded in the Koran, concerning holy war.
Without descending to details, such as the difference in treatment accorded to those who have the "Book" and the "infidels," he turns to his interlocutor somewhat brusquely with the central question on the relationship between religion and violence in general, in these words: "Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached."
The emperor goes on to explain in detail the reasons why spreading the faith through violence is something unreasonable. Violence is incompatible with the nature of God and the nature of the soul. "God is not pleased by blood, and not acting reasonably ("syn logo") is contrary to God's nature.
Now, obviously, the “Show me what is new that is not evil” phrase is offensive and I can understand that. I have also read that the Pope and his experts are wrong in that the “There is no compulsion in religion” statement occurred not in an early, powerless period, but later at a time when Mohammad was secure. Should the Pope have avoided the “show me” phrase? I think so. Was his use of this phrase intended to cause offense? I don’t think so. Rather, I personally believe that put on the professor’s hat and spoke as one would in a university setting.
The Pope’s other reference to Islam is:
The decisive statement in this argument against violent conversion is this: Not to act in accordance with reason is contrary to God's nature. The editor, Theodore Khoury, observes: For the emperor, as a Byzantine shaped by Greek philosophy, this statement is self-evident. But for Muslim teaching, God is absolutely transcendent. His will is not bound up with any of our categories, even that of rationality. Here Khoury quotes a work of the noted French Islamist R. Arnaldez, who points out that Ibn Hazn went so far as to state that God is not bound even by his own word, and that nothing would oblige him to reveal the truth to us. Were it God's will, we would even have to practice idolatry.
Now, I have no idea whether this is a true characterization of Hazn’s thought. But it is very interesting, and my own church had a rather unpleasant dispute over the nature of God. The minister thought that God did not inflict tragedies upon people such as, for example, spina bifida to innocent babies. One rather conservative and powerful member of the congregation thought that this was blasphemy, since it denied the all powerful nature of God. The Elders had their hearing, and they wisely in my judgment ruled that there was room for debate, and the dissatisfied member left the church to find one where the true Word of God was preached.
So, when I looked at Geoff’s cartoon, I could see the humor. But, unfortunately, as with the balance of his opinion pieces, I found the humor based on a misunderstanding. Had the Pope’s speech been given at a conference designed to foster good relations among faiths, I would have laughed my pope’s nose off. But it wasn’t, it was given at a university in a context quite different, arguing for the continued role of faith in reason and vice versa. Do we really want to limit what can be discussed there?
Go Blue! http://www.mgoblue.com
9:02 AM
Never let that fire in your belly go out!
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