Inexhausted

"What," the graphic asked, "is Black Fatigue?"

It gave five answers:

• The fatigue that comes from the pain and anguish of living with racism every single day of your life.
• The constant fatigue of not knowing whether you or a loved one will come home alive.
• Enduring the ravages of intergenerational racism.
• Being fatigued by those who are surprised and express outrage (with no action) that such inequities still exist.
• The fear, frustration, anger and rage that is part of many Black people's daily lives.

I get where this sort of thing is coming from, even as I wonder about its overall effectiveness.

I'm of the opinion that it's not helpful to give other people a veto over one's peace of mind, because they're likely to exercise that veto. Not out of spite or animus, but simply as a side effect of looking out for themselves and attending to the priorities that are important to them. And I suspect that for at least a sizable minority of the American public, if racism were to end tomorrow, they wouldn't notice its absence. And that means that it isn't a priority for them; they have problems of their own to worry about. Accordingly, it being a constant weight on one's shoulders is a recipe for unhappiness, because it's not likely to go anywhere on anything approaching a reasonable timeframe. Depending on who one might ask, or how one defines the phenomenon, racism in the sense that we understand it today dates back from anywhere from the Middle Ages to Classical Greece. It's likely not going anywhere anytime soon.

The fact that many Americans (of all racial backgrounds) lead lives of enduring desperation (quiet or not), fear and/or uncertainty is certainly a failure of the United State's vaunted ideals. And in the face of this, a commitment to "personal responsibility" (which often, ironically, is seen as a commitment that entire demographic groups should make) comes across as victim-blaming. Even so, there is something to be said for changing what one can change, and simply letting the rest of it go. Beating the drum over racism doesn't make it any more salient of a concern to those for whom it isn't a real problem. But the idea that it constantly erodes mind, body and spirit, or that it's a continuing problem for the mental health of the Black community serves as a constant reminder of the inability of Black Americans to either solve the problem, or insulate themselves from it. And what does that do to help anything?

I understand that, for many Black people, my outlook on life is nothing more than proof that I've turned my back on my people, and bought into a culture of White supremacy. Perhaps that is true; I don't claim to have a particularly clear perspective on myself, given the lack of distance between me, myself and I. But if my understanding of people in general is even somewhat accurate, ceding the ability to be happy in life, or at least satisfied, to others is simply a bad idea. I decided that I wasn't going to let racism get me down, because I could exercise at least that much control over my life. Were the fact there are people for whom the unequal nature of life in the United States surprising, but not motivating, a reliable source of fatigue, I wouldn't even have that. Homo Sapiens doesn't live up to the hype. It never has. I've never found accepting that fact to be particularly uplifting; only better than the alternative.

Private Show

A busker puts on a show for three in Seattle's Lake City neighborhood. The small park here was, for a time, a fairly populous homeless encampment.
 

Gone Green

I grew up in the distant suburbs of Chicago, where pretty much the only "ethnic" food generally available was Chinese and (pseudo) Mexican. (Random suburban pizza places do not count as Italian food...) There was a much broader selection in the city proper, but it wasn't until I moved to Seattle that I started really branching out. But still having my rather pedestrian Midwestern tastes, I have yet to acquire an appreciation for avocado, mainly because I'm one of those people who dislikes the taste of cilantro, and so tend to avoid Tex-Mex and Mexican food. But not being a fan of avocado also means that I don't eat much in the way of roll sushi, since it tends to be a pretty common ingredient.

Being pretty sure that avocado is not native to Japan, I was curious why it was so common in sushi. The simple answer is that many sushi rolls are American creations; to the extent that they exist in Japan in the same forms they do here, they've effectively been re-imported. The slightly more complex answer to why so much sushi contains avocado is one of immigrant ingenuity; what's at question is whether they were working around supply chains or Americans.

The first explanation I found for the prevalence of avocado in sushi (on the website of a local sushi restaurant) was that a Japanese chef in Los Angeles couldn't source fatty tuna for their sushi, and avocado was a good substitute for texture and consistency. The second explanation is that Americans didn't like the taste of raw tuna, in much the same way that uramaki sushi rolls were developed because of American dislike of the texture of seaweed.

Now, I'm going to admit that I tend to have a rather limited palate; I'm not that experimental when it comes to food. Which is part of the reason why, when I vacationed in Japan, I would simply point to a random menu entry and eat that. The upside was I had some amazing food I wouldn't have thought to order. (The downside was I don't know what any of it was called.) So I understand the idea that foreign cuisines tend to be (sometimes heavily) modified for American tastes.

But the competing narratives over the inclusion of avocado, rather than tuna also speak to how people, domestic and overseas, see the United States. While both are stories of innovation, one is a story of needing to work around Americans' refusal to try different foods, and I suspect that it sticks around specifically because it plays into people's understanding of the United States.

Overinformed

I was reading an article online the other day about jury selection for The People of the State of New York v. Donald J. Trump. It gave some basic data on the seven people selected by that point; things like occupation, employer, what part of New York they live in and where they were originally from.

"This is a bad idea," I said to myself.

Sure enough, today we learn that a juror has bowed out because people have managed to track them down, and they're afraid for their safety.

Data Privacy is about more than keeping just sensitive information safe. When I read the article, I was fairly sure that, even with the scant details listed, I could track down at least one of the people selected, because some of the information presented, when taken together, couldn't be more than a very small number of people, thus allowing for triangulation from public records.

And the article I read was fairly circumspect in what they published. I'm sure that others went into more detail, given that Judge Merchan has directed reporters to not publish physical descriptions of jurors (among other things). But as the public, there is no need to know any of it. I, as a member of the public, don't need to know where any of the jurors live or where they are from or what they do for a living or where they work or what they look like. None of that is germane to the case itself. It's effectively trivia, with no genuine relevance to the matter at hand. Institutions that deal with data have to recognize that.

The information was shared precisely because media outlets believed that it would garner public attention. Which was a reasonable expectation, given the number of people who have taken an interest in anyone associated with the various legal cases against the former President. An interest that could have been predicted to lead to doxxing, given the atmosphere around some of Mr. Trump's other legal entanglements.

Unsung

The country's leader Ramzan Kadyrov told culture minister Musa Dadayev to make its music "conform to the Chechen mentality", said The Moscow Times. Announcing the ban, Dadayev said: "Chechen musical culture has always been diverse in tempo and methodology. We must pass on our cultural heritage to our children: the customs, traditions, our adats [traditional laws], nokhchalla [code of honour] – features of the Chechen character, which includes the entire spectrum of moral and ethical standards of life of the Chechens."
Why Chechnya has banned music that is 'too fast or too slow'

This is one of those things that occurs when I'm reading a book; I start to notice the parallels between that book and real-world events. In The Republic, one of first ideas that Socrates puts forth in the service of creating his ideal state is, effectively, censorship. Bad stories lead to bad character, and so the Guardian class (and presumably everyone else) need to be protected from those stories that do no reflect the world as Socrates thinks that it should be (and in some cases, is). Music is also on the list of things that Plato's Socrates thinks needs to be controlled. "Give me these two modes," says Socrates, "one stern, one pleasant, which will best represent sound courage and moderation in good fortune or in bad." All other music, such as that suitable for dirges, lamentations, relaxation and drinking songs, is to be banned from the State that Socrates and his interlocutors are planning. The goal here is to have music fit for the training of soldiers, but since it also happens to be the only morally upright music, it's all that anyone would be able to access.

So the idea that music carries the moral and ethical standard of a people, and music that does not conform should be restricted or banned is not new. Previously, the whole thing would have simply struck me as silly. And to a degree, it still does; I'm still not convinced that the ideals laid down in The Republic for a just state are to be taken at all seriously. But I expect that Plato meant for them to taken seriously, if not strictly literally. Granted, I haven't finished the book yet, but it seems that Plato is simply taking the Nurture side of the Nature versus Nurture debate to its logical conclusion. If people are shaped by their environments, if one can control the environment, then one can ensure that the people turn out properly. And that's a theme that recurs over and over again in human history.

In Chechnya's case, I suspect that the immediate impact of the new rules will be to make the country a laughingstock. The article in The Week wasn't exactly praising the decision. Whether it has anything approaching the intended effect remains to be seen. Conventional wisdom says that the ability of people to access information from all over the world will bring their efforts to naught; but people said as much about China's ability to control information, and that has mostly turned out to be wrong. So perhaps the Chechens have a shot at it.