Women Who Hold Their Own Are Fine Role Models

             Women Who Hold Their Own Are Fine Role Models

                   Published in Marietta Daily Journal December 18, 2016

            Woman without her man is lost.

            Punctuate the sentence above to fit your own, uh, perceptions.  In the interest of harmony, husbands and wives should neither work together on this nor share their answers.

In my immediate family, I’ve had lots of women in my life: my mother, ten sisters, six sisters-in-law, one wife, two daughters, six granddaughters, and two daughters-in-law.  Add several scores of female colleagues in the teaching profession.  If I don’t know very much about women, I should.

  One thing I do know is that nobody should fear the “feminization” of education just because women outnumber men in public schools.  The women with whom I’ve taught, though quite feminine, have not been weak.  In fact, I’ve seen the most petite of women put the toughest of 17-year-old boys in their place, with words of course, and those effective, pointing fingers.

            More than once I’ve paused or slowed down my walk in the hall because I saw a female teacher dealing with a tall, strapping boy at the door of her classroom.  Thinking she might need a man around, I would approach gently, only to discover that I was superfluous.  Believe it, female teachers can be tough and are not to be pitied.

            If I’m already sounding sexist, I just don’t care.  If I believe a lady is in need, I’m going to run to her, no matter what changes are going on in today’s crazy world regarding gender and gender reference.  Any man who wouldn’t, well …

            Actually, I’m glad there are so many women in education.  The guys need them.  They need them so that they can learn about women.  And girls need male teachers so that they can learn about men.  I know, I know.  This train of thought goes against the utterly senseless gender neutrality squawk that we’re all supposed to be swallowing.  We’re no longer male and female, you know.  We are the world; we are the people.  No differences, please.  Differences would make us unequal.

            It’s been fun all these decades watching male coaches interact with high school girls.  I love coaches.  Parents of non-athletes may not realize what an important part coaches play in the development of their youths.  Most coaches also teach academic courses, so they influence more than just their athletes.  Usually they are well known by the entire student body, head coaches and assistants both.

            Speaking of almost 100% of the male coaches I’ve taught with, I can say that they are an indispensable part of the development of young people whom they teach or coach.  Coaches are a symbol of masculinity (pardon another ugly sexist word).  Coaches are typically fun and are good teachers.  Taking their coaching skills into the classroom, they know how to demonstrate, not just tell.  What I’ve most admired them for, however, is their modeling for the guys how to view and treat the girls.

            My ten sisters have shaped my life as much as anyone I know.  Mentally I clump them according to age.  Ida, Jewel, and Authula are the oldest.  Children of the 1920’s, they have always epitomized beauty and character.  Margueritte and Minnie are ‘30’s girls, although Margueritte was born in 1928.  Almedia, Ruby, and Janelle were born in the ‘30’s but came of age in the ‘40’s.  Carolyn and Tressie are ‘50’s girls, the first to grow up in America’s new youth culture.  They survived and thrived.

            I have long wished that every friend I have could meet these intelligent, interesting women.  Their birthdays range from 1922 to 1942.  They all have the same parents whom they have honored all of their lives. Their love and respect for each other is endless.  They have raised their children well.  Quiet strength is their forte, humility their path, laughter their constant companion.  Cotton fields never marred their beauty.  Life’s struggles never diminished their faith.  I wish I were their equal.

            My mind always goes to these sisters and to my six brothers every time I read or hear about the fuss over gender.  Even Princeton University joined the foolishness last fall, imploring their students not to speak or write in “gender-based” words so as not to show disrespect of others who are “transgender, gender queer, or gender nonconforming.”

            Gender nonconforming?  Since when have we had a choice?  Look, my sisters are outstanding W-O-M-E-N. That’s females.  And my brothers are exemplary M-E-N; males, that is.  The joy of my life has been to be a little brother to all of them, except my kid brother who is “the baby.”  I’m not his equal either.

Roger Hines

12/14/16

The Status of Christmas: Are We Denying our Own Culture?

  The Status of Christmas: Are We Denying our Own Culture?

               Published in Marietta Daily Journal Dec. 11, 2016

             Christmas is here!  Not Christmas Day just yet, but Christmas season.  Is there anything that elicits more joy in America than Christmas?  Anything that more quickly turns our thoughts to goodwill, children, the needy, and to giving? 

            We’re all aware of the commercialization of the Christmas season, of how easily seduced we are to think of things rather than people.   Yet, Christmas still seems to bring out the best in us.  Individuals, families, and organizations look around for people who need help at Christmas.  We want everybody to have “a good Christmas.”

            Since for over two centuries the total impact of Christmas has been positive, why and how did we get to the point where the word “Christmas” is to be shunned?   What trail of events led President-elect Trump to exclaim boldly, “We will say ‘Christmas’ again”?

            The answer is that for two decades or more many schools and businesses have been gun shy about even using the word, much less allowing its celebration.  We celebrate vague “holidays” instead, ignoring the fact that “holiday” is but a variant spelling of “holy day.”  

 Many school systems insist on the term “Winter Holidays,” which is purely druidic, the Druids being the 200 BC (oops, I mean BCE) Celts of the British Isles who were devout worshippers of nature.  Schools have actually only substituted one religious term for another.  The Star of Bethlehem is out.  The Winter Solstice is in.  Presumably, students are to turn their thoughts to the tilt of the earth, and away from its creator. 

It is difficult to deny the reality of religious beliefs and roots.  We cannot escape transcendent terminology. Every culture has a set of beliefs and principles that inform and shape it.  How foolish, how ignorant it is, to deny this fact.

Of course, America’s religious and cultural roots lie deep not only in Druidic thought, but in Buddhism, Hinduism, and Islam.  Buddhism is the reason Americans believe in and seek karma.  Hinduism is why Americans believe in thousands of gods.  Islam is the reason Americans believe the word of God must be read in Arabic. Right?

Not really.  America’s ethos springs from none of these belief systems.  These systems have informed Southeast Asia, India, and the Middle East.  America’s foundational religious, legal, and social ideas and ideals have their roots in the richness of the Judeo-Christian ethic and tradition.   Who with any amount of historical or cultural knowledge would deny this?

Yet we are not supposed to say it.  A false and stupid sensitivity has led us to deny historical truth and be tippy-toe about who we are.  Do Buddhist, Hindu, or Islamic countries deny what has shaped their cultures?  They certainly don’t.  Why then should Americans deny that the Ten Commandments and the Sermon on the Mount are the basis of our ethics and morality?  What has fashioned America more, the Dhamma, the Vedas, the Koran, or the Bible?

Don’t answer that.  Misled college kids will bristle with hostility and protest in your front yard.

Whether they are afraid of lawsuits or simply personally opposed to Christmas, school officials are denying that Christmas is a part of the American psyche.  This fact about our ethical roots doesn’t mean that everyone has to celebrate Christmas or believe in the Christ of Christmas.  Not everybody in Indonesia, the world’s most Islamic nation, is Islamic, but Indonesia certainly doesn’t deny her Islamic culture because of it.           

            We must be pluralistic and multicultural, we’re told.  Frankly, the entire West is about to pluralize and multi-culturalize itself out of an identity.  Unlike the East, Western civilization has become unsure of itself.  Witness the ongoing transformation of Europe.  In many pockets of America, self-loathing is the order of the day.  This is particularly true on college campuses where students are taught to respect the beliefs of others, but not dare have any of their own.  Acknowledge the cultures of other lands, but don’t embrace your own too tightly; otherwise you are “nationalistic” or “nativistic.”

            Just as public schools must now say “Winter Holidays” instead of Christmas, colleges require students to use BCE rather than BC.  BC is a reference to Christ, so none of that.  Of course BCE refers to the “Common Era” which means the Christian era, but at least for extreme multiculturalists the word Christ is gone.

            It is such anti mindset that now encircles Christmas. The Grinch that is still trying to steal Christmas is not the mighty dollar.  It’s the deniers of historical facts who just don’t like the facts.

            Christmas lovers, unite!  And spread the love, particularly to those who don’t love Christmas. And give, give, give!  That’s what the Christ of Christmas taught us to do.

Roger Hines

12/6/16  

Tyranny and Tyrants and How to Avoid Them

            Tyranny and Tyrants and How to Avoid Them

               Published in Marietta Daily Journal Dec. 4, 2016

            Of the French Revolution, de Tocqueville wrote, “The evils which are endured with patience as long as they are inevitable, become intolerable as soon as hope can be entertained of escaping them.”

            In other words, the hope of better things incites people to act.  So was it in the presidential election.  New voters, formerly cynical about politics and government, came out of the woodwork.  So is it also in regard to the recent death of Fidel Castro, one of the world’s longest ruling tyrants.

            Castro’s death brings to mind de Tocqueville’s ruminations.  It also inspires questions about tyranny and tyrants.  Why would anyone want to be a tyrant or an absolute monarch, lording it over people?   Why would anyone want to either lead or send out vast armies in order to build an empire over which to rule?  How do we explain an Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar, Napoleon, Stalin, Hitler, Mao, or Castro?  Why has the world had to endure them?

            Castro’s entire adult life was spent living out the very definition of tyrant. In 1959 at age 33, Castro and his rebels seized control of Cuba.  The New York Times applauded him, and so did the good ole Reader’s Digest and most Americans.  After all, the object of Castro’s rage was dictator Fulgencio Batista.  Let’s just say Batista was one of the world’s worst men.  He needed to be toppled.

            But only to be replaced by an equally power-hungry tyrant?  Castro moved fast.  Only 18 months after seizing power, he nationalized U.S. owned oil refineries.  Relations between Cuba and the U.S. from that point to today are well known.            

 The failed Bay of Pigs invasion, actually staged by Cuban exiles, and supported by President Kennedy, embarrassed America.  Our prestige was restored a year and a half later when our blockade of Cuba forced the Soviet Union to remove her nuclear missiles lodged 90 miles from Miami.

            Thirty-six days shy of 58 years, the sneering, cigar-chomping Castro sat atop his little island empire, having taken over almost all private businesses (but, of course; he declared Cuba a socialist state 2 years after seizing power), executing hundreds of his opponents, sentencing dissidents to prison, and hobnobbing with the world’s most notable tyrant thugs. 

            So why did Barbara Walters interview Castro so adoringly?  Why are so many American liberals and college students (I repeat myself) praising him so effusively now?

            More importantly, what gives rise to a Castro and other tyrants like him who dot the trail of world history?  Whether petty tyrants or emperors, their evil minds have led to more human misery than have natural disasters.  What drives them? Why must they conquer and control?

            I’m guessing that each of them has a void within.  They are needy.  We know that Alexander and Napoleon were.  Their towering ambition, according to biographers, masked a need to be known, seen, and affirmed.  What most of us perceive as a supersized ego is actually a supersized hole, an emptiness that cries, “At some level of my existence, I am nobody. I need to be somebody.”

            So is it true of many a manager, a department head, a principal, a CEO, an employer of any stripe, or even a religious leader.  Running the show assuages their need.

            This analysis doesn’t fit everyone who leads or seeks leadership.  Compare the tyrants named above to Cincinnatus, Lincoln, Reagan, Rome’s “good emperors,” or even Mike Pence.  Ambition has taken no toll on these men.  The world has been blessed with many leaders whose motives are genuinely altruistic.

            Even so, we foolishly disregard history if we think the time will never come when a charismatic figure could lead America from a representative republic to an autocracy.  Hard times and prolonged disenfranchisement have more than once led law-abiding citizens to act uncharacteristically. 

Ironically, those who burn flags and put down the freest country in the world are fanning the flames of tyranny.  In stretching freedom so far, they tempt others to restrict it.

No one has a better opportunity for improving the human condition, for alleviating hardship, all the while expecting excellence, than do those in positions of leadership.  This is true not just of political leaders but of the boss of only four employees down at the body shop.

“He that ruleth over men must be just.”  Tyrants are neither leaders nor just.  They are drivers.  They crush men’s souls. We avoid their evil only with Jefferson’s “eternal vigilance.”

Good leaders successfully woo and inspire.  We have never needed them more than now.

             

Roger Hines

11/30/16