Human Decency Wins Again

Posted on June 25, 2024 by Ron Byrnes

Life downtown means interacting with the Walking Wounded. Regularly.

Two times in as many weeks I’ve happily been ignored while next up in the grocery store check out line.

Both times the cashiers showed exceptional care and kindness to the down-and-out people in front of me. With no concern for the rest of us in line.

The first time the cashier explained that he knew the customer and always took extra time to do right by him and his guide dog. Although he didn’t need to, he also thanked me for my patience. I wish I had the presence of mind to thank him for taking his time to see the troubled person and for honoring his humanity.

A lot of people who are caring and kind normally aren’t especially either one when it comes to the homeless. Which perplexes me. It’s almost as if they’re offended by their poverty, addictions, and mental health issues. How dare they be poor, addicted, schizophrenic.

No one likes encampments in public spaces or personal property crime. But if we have to be angry, maybe we should direct our anger at ourselves for not making any more headway than we have in solving the crisis.

Granted, it’s a vexing, multi-faceted challenge. I suspect progress depends on more of us following the lead of patient, kind-hearted grocery store cashiers.

Pro Proximity

Posted on May 29, 2024 by Ron Byrnes

I’m sorry, but as a professor I have to sporadically use unnecessarily complex words. Like “sporadically” in place of “once in awhile”.

More illustrative of this professional obligation is the term “dialectical dilemma” which is when two seemingly conflicting things are true at the same time. Por exemplar, I annoy people*, you annoy people, people inevitably annoy one another, a little or a lot, some of the time, or nearly all of the time. It’s just baked into our daily lives. We give and we get.

Social scientists keep learning about all the ways close interpersonal relationships, or more plainly friendships, are essential to our well-being. Especially as we get closer to senior discounts.

So what are we to do? We annoy each other, but need each other.

Some people choose to live in remote settings where they’re way less likely to interact with others. Thus, they’re way less likely to be annoyed, while simultaneously giving up the substantial benefits of social interaction.

To each is own of course, but I’m convinced we should embrace the risks of being annoyed by living in closer proximity to others. Put differently, we should design our lives so we have to interact with others on a regular basis. Knowing our feathers are going to get ruffled.

Zillow has a cool feature called the “Walk Score” for residences. Our old home had a Walk Score of 0. Our new one has a Walk Score of 65. From the country to the city we go.

One day last week, the Good Wife tricked me bigly. “Do you want to weed the front together?” she asked. I knew I was looking especially fetching, but that was a shameless come-on if I ever heard one. I pictured us rolling around in the dirt. Maybe? Instead, once I got into full tree trimming and power weeding mode, she announced she was going inside.

Then. It. Happened. It turns out we live on a major bike route. Someday, if you bike from downtown Olympia to the Westside, you will go right by our house. In an hour, 15-20 cyclists went by. Of all sizes and shapes. After a kitted-out BTorian passed on his mountain bike, he turned back and said, “Is that Ron Byrnes?!”

A little later Suzie, the owner of a downtown art gallery stopped on her ginormous Specialized e-bike. And we talked and talked and talked. She asked me when I’m getting an e-bike, which in hindsight, prob shoulda prepared me for the Burgerville bullshit.

And then Burke, from two houses down came over, and we talked. About how middle schoolers care about one thing, peer relations, and therefore will say ANYTHING to preserve them.

Long story short, in one hour I spontaneously interacted with more people than I did in eight years at our Nature Park residence. Which is good for me, because I’m an introvert.

So six miles and 65 points later, I’m damn near a social butterfly. A slight exaggeration, but don’t hate me because you ain’t me.

*Last week, when I was in too big of a hurry, I may have left my Costco cart against a curb in the parking lot instead of returning it to the cart stand. A women in a minivan slow rolled right by me, GLARED at me and then WAGGED her finger at me as if I had just run over a kitten and a puppy. It was so over the top, it didn’t have the intended effect. Instead of feeling shamed, I felt amused and amazed that I could annoy her that easily.

Add Andrew Huberman To The List

Posted on March 26, 2024 by Ron Byrnes

Of famous figures capitalizing on the public’s tendency towards gullibility.

I read this lengthy takedown of Huberman so you don’t have to. You’re welcome.

The two most telling paragraphs are easily skipped over because of their seeming ordinariness.

“On Thanksgiving in 2018, Sarah planned to introduce Andrew to her parents and close friends. She was cooking. Andrew texted repeatedly to say he would be late, then later. According to a friend, ‘he was just, ‘Oh yeah, I’ll be there. Oh, I’m going to be running hours late.’ And then of course, all of these things were planned around his arrival and he just kept going, ‘Oh, I’m going to be late.’ And then it’s the end of the night and he’s like, ‘Oh, I’m so sorry this and this happened.’

Huberman disappearing was something of a pattern. Friends, girlfriends, and colleagues describe him as hard to reach. The list of reasons for not showing up included a book, time-stamping the podcast, Costello (his dog), wildfires, and a ‘meetings tunnel.’ ‘He is flaky and doesn’t respond to things,’ says his friend Brian MacKenzie, a health influencer who has collaborated with him on breathing protocols. ‘And if you can’t handle that, Andrew definitely is not somebody you want to be close to.’

“Flaky” is far too generous a word. Where was Huberman when he didn’t show? The profile would suggest with one of the six women he was in relationship with at the same time.

It turns out, thanks to the powers of duplicity coupled with the public’s gullibility, you can become famous, rich, and influential as a podcaster, salesperson, and academic without showing up for colleagues or even close personal friends. Repeatedly.

But “showing up” is a prerequisite for being a decent human being.

Kara Swisher And The Female Ego

Posted on March 13, 2024 by Ron Byrnes

I regularly listen to both of Kara Swisher’s podcasts, her own, and hers with Scott Galloway. As a result, I’m an expert on all things KSwish.

She’s a fascinating case study in gender because she prides herself in being atypically female. Her extreme self-confidence often tips over into bragging about herself. She makes no apologies for being the self proclaimed “best tech journalist” currently working. When you look up “swagger” in the dictionary. . .

She is good at what she does and she has accomplished a lot. At present, she’s on a nationwide book tour for her new book, Burn Book: A Tech Love Story, which is selling well. Among other things, people like that she’s so opinionated.

Normally, I think of her braggadocio as a harmless personality quirk, but her promoting of her book tour is proving way, way too much. The to-this-point undefeated male ego has finally met its match. Name an especially egregious male whose ego runs amok. KSwish would give that dude a run for his money.

Case in point. She recently bragged about doing the best job of anyone reporting on what really happened with Sam Altman’s firing and rehiring at OpenAI. She said something to the effect of, “It was cool to see I still got it. And that I can still be the best beat reporter going.” Swisher isn’t a reporter anymore because her ever expanding ego makes it impossible to defer to interview subjects. She has to be the story. End of story.

Maybe a women with an unbridled ego is alright, fuck the patriarchy and all, but I’m repelled by egomaniacs of either gender. I’m at an “advanced” stage of my life where I’m drawn to people who sublimate their ego in the service of others. Especially when that service takes the form of disciplined listening. Of choosing not to speak. Of looking, and listening, and learning.

That said, I am down with KSwish-like ambition. And even her admittedly excessive work ethic and intense focus on professional status. With the critical caveat that we keep Qoheleth’s Old Testament Ecclesiastes insight front and center—that’s there’s a season for everything. Including ambition, professional status, and ego.

In your 20s, 30s, and 40s, go crazy. Be ambitious. Work hard. Achieve things. Line your pockets. Increase your status.

But KSwish, like your Humble Blogger, was born in 1962. And listening to her promote herself over and over makes me wonder, when should one stop giving a shit? When is the time to cull our professional “to do” lists and create space for others?

Of course it’s a personal decision. KSwish would vehemently reject my suggestion that we think about our professional identities in terms of life chapters. She would profanely brush off my suggestion that we defer to our younger colleagues on their way up.

And that’s her prerogative.

I’m repelled by KSwish’s self promoting, look-at-me, in-your-face ego. But, but being the expert I am, I can say this with total confidence. She doesn’t give a shit about what I think about her. Which is her most appealing trait.

I’m A Socialist

Posted on January 12, 2024 by Ron Byrnes

Weight loss drugs inventor Lotte Bjerre Knudsen says proudly adding, “I don’t care that much about money.”

One two-part myth people in the (dis)United States ignorantly perpetuate about socialism is that it fails everywhere because it zaps people’s motivation to work. That absent economic incentives, people won’t achieve much of anything.

Ethnocentric capitalists maintain their collective ignorance of socialists, and socialism, by not knowing the Lotte Bjerre Knudsens of the world. Cue a recent LBK interview.

DER SPIEGEL: You have made Novo Nordisk Europe’s most valuable company, with a greater market capitalization than Daimler, Bayer, Lufthansa and BMW combined. Do you benefit financially?

Knudsen: I don’t care that much about money, I’m a socialist! Here in Scandinavia, we teach our children teamwork from an early age. It’s not about the individual. And that’s how I am too. I have never asked for a raise in 34 years.

DER SPIEGEL: You never got more money? Not even now?

Knudsen: Yes, of course. But I didn’t push. I can’t see that capitalism and money make people happy. At Novo Nordisk, I have always preferred to use my credibility to demand more funding for science, not more salary for myself. I also have no intellectual property rights. They belong to the company because I gave them up when I was employed.

I don’t care about money? It’s not about the individual? I can’t see that capitalism and money make people happy?

Holy blasphemy.

‘My Truth as I Know It’

Posted on October 29, 2023 by Ron Byrnes

This Canadian Broadcast Corporation’s Buffy Sainte-Marie documentary convinced me that she’s the most famous of the growing legion of Pretendians, the clever name given to people who falsely claim to be indigenous.

A lot of people are mad at the CBC, but their argument is not angry or mean-spirited, it’s relentlessly thorough and thoughtful, a model of investigative reporting.

This preemptive salvo Sainte-Marie penned wreaks of desperation to keep her house of cards from completely crumbling.

Alternatively, Sainte-Marie’s title, “My Truth As I Know It” may have been “My Truth As I Psychologically Need It To Be”. “My Truth As I Know It” is the quintessential phrase of our time. Just like Sainte-Marie and the many other Pretendians, Trump acolytes still talk about the 2020 election results as “the truth as they know it”. And that of course, is the tip of the conspiratorial iceburg.

Trump and his acolytes went 0-60 on legal challenges to the 2020 election results. Judge after judge said this is “the actual truth” of the matter. Objectively. All those judges, so old fashioned.

For over sixty years, Sainte-Marie has woven such an elaborate web of lies that she was unable to title her defense, “The Truth”.

Even at 82 years old, Sainte-Marie is a woman for our times where masses of people spew the truth as only they, and their gullible fellow travelers, know it.

Can You Explain This To Me?

Posted on September 18, 2023 by Ron Byrnes

A few days ago I was cycling southbound on the Chehalis Western Trail (CWT), a gem of Thurston County public infrastructure. And thanks to attentive parents, I successfully dodged a few 3 year-oldish riders on those amazingly small bikes that darn near enable babies to ride home from the hospital under their own power.

And I wondered what would it be like to be three years-old, to live through the 21st Century and check out sometime in the 2100’s? On the surface, probably pretty great since technology and medical advances continue to amaze and you don’t have to go the Department of Motor Vehicles in person anymore. And some of us don’t have to go to gas stations. And global poverty is way down. And despite Fox News propaganda, crime is down. And despite serious income inequality and low savings rates, people can find jobs and the economy is resilient.

And yet.

I wouldn’t want to be my tiny CWT cycling friends because if I had to capture the current zeitgeist in one word it’s “sad”. Despite continuing substantive improvements to our quality of life, a critical mass of people in the (dis)United States seem, for lack of a better term, sad. Why is that?

And why don’t I know the answers to that. Does my multi-layered privilege blind me? Short answer, of course.

I don’t think I’ll beat myself up for not knowing, because as I tell my students, “It’s okay to not be okay. And it’s okay to be okay.” Still, I would like to better understand why you are sad or why people you know well are sad. Is it as simple as the rent is too damn high or is it climate anxiety or is the answer more abstract, philosophical, even spiritual?

If you accept my premise, that we’re in the grips of a wave of sadness that shows no signs of abating, please enlighten me as to why. Thank you in advance.