"The Unopen Mind, Or At Least Less Open Than I Thought It Was"

I am such an idiot!

“Again?”

This is a whole new area of idiocy.  Now you can feel superior to me in an entirely different arena. 

“It almost sounds like you’re bragging.”

That’s right.  I’m gunning to be the most disreputable blogger in the universe.

DISREPUTABLE MARTIAN BLOGGER:  “I’m off the hook!”

Congratulations. 

Okay.  This observation, as usual, is culled from a “Sampling of One” – which reminds me of the joke:

“He’s a self-made man.” 

“It’s true.  Nobody else would help.” 

My sampling is “One”, because I do not like to impose upon other people’s lives for my intellectual experiments.  So I stick to unilaterally imposing upon my own.

And this is what I have startlingly – and disappointingly – discovered.

I bought a book… wait, lemme say this first.  No, lemme start with the book thing first.  (Sorry for subjecting to that intrapersonal dustup.) 

I bought a book maybe six months ago that I read about in the Sunday New York Times Book Review section and it looked to be up my alley, so I Amazoned away for it. 

The book is 348 pages long.  And in the six months since I ordered it, I have only made it to Page 47. 

Okay, now the other thing. 

There is nothing I am less enthusiastic about than adversarialism.  The extremely popular “Us” versus “Them” configuration – countries, ethnicities, religions, (sometimes) genders, football rivalries.  Name two groups that have a reflexive enmity towards each other, and I am opposed to the entire operation.

I hate adversarialism the way Lou Grant hated spunk.  Although I have heard experts in my wife’s field of psychoanalysis assert that the adversarial attitude derives directly from our genetic wiring. 

Looking down on another group, they explain, maintains our own sense of superiority, or it makes us forget how much we dislike ourselves.   (Something in that area.  I have been known to fall asleep during the lectures.)

Conventional Wisdom:  There has always been adversarialism, and there always will be.  The best you can do, the psychoanalytical experts advise, is to acknowledge the reality of adversarialism, and to manage it as best as you can.  (Which probably meant staying out of Turkey for a little while, but we didn’t listen.)

Okay.

So here’s a book – you remember the book? – entitled The Undivided Past (by David Cannadine.)  And the argument of this book – and the reason it originally caught my attention – is that the adversarial scenario of history has been disproportionately –  and deleteriously – overstated. 

I cannot tell you much more about it, because I am only on Page 47, so there’s, like, three hundred pages to go (although some of them are footnotes, and I’ll probably skip those.  Still, I am not that far into it.)

The book provides (lesserly publicized) examples from history, where ancient cultures and religions, theoretically committed to annihilating each other, instead, at times, actually cooperated.

And I think that’s the track the book will continue to follow, providing countervailing contradictions to the Conventional Wisdom, thus evidencing that people – making the late Rodney King smile in his posthumous locale – indeed can, in fact, all get along.

Why is it then generally accepted that we can’t?  Because, on numerous other occasions, we haven’t. 

See:  Every war that has ever been fought.  (Plus brothers, roughhousing for keeps.)

Maybe later in the book, there’ll be a statistical comparison – the proportion of times when we have gotten along compared to the proportional number of times when we haven’t.  Or maybe the book’s just arguing, with historical examples, that getting along is not entirely out of the question.  I don’t know because I’m only on page 47.

Now here’s my point. 

I am a confirmed enthusiast of non-adversarialism.  (I thought Ghandi had an attitude.  Ba-dump-bump.)  And yet, here is a book, whose argument I unequivocally support, and after a half-year’s passing…

I am still only on Page 47!

Why? 

I guess because, deep down, I have this sneaking suspicion that the psychoanalyst experts are correct.  As reflected in Mel Brooks’s 2000-Year-Old Man cave anthem:

“Let ‘em all go to hell except Cave Seventy-Eight!”

Still, the situation is disturbing to me.  Here is a book providing evidence of my deeper down belief:  That adversarialism is not inevitable.

And I am unable to get through it.

Why? 

It would appear it’s because I have this idea in my head that, though I wish it were otherwise, adversarialism is inevitable.

And I do not want to give it up.  (By risking exposing myself to contradictory evidence.)

This lead to this even more troubling concern:

There’s a book I agree with, and I can barely read it.

What then are my chances of reading a book that I don’t agree with?

(Side Note, And A Cautionary Warning To Writers:  Why do we believe adversarialism is inevitable?  One reason, at least:  Because “The Huguenots got along with the Jews” is not that interesting a story.  Thus, it did not appear prominently, if at all, in the history books.  The more electrifying history book stories, that we read and remember – collectively reinforce our adversarial expectations. 

(Note:  I do not know if the Huguenots actually did get along with the Jews.  I just pulled that example out of the air, and because I like the word Huguenots.  But I sure hope that they did.)

"We Made A Pie"

“Do you want to make a pie?”

We have a number of fruit trees in our backyard.  Most of them are of the citrus variety, appropriate to the terrain.  But we also have an apple tree. 

A lot of our fruit gets picked over by birds before we get to it.  We have a large fig tree beside our driveway, but almost all the figs get eaten up by the flyover avian traffic, who later, figs being digestion enhancers, drop numerous unwanted deposits on our outdoor furniture.

The ten or so apples that our recently planted apple tree produced, some normal sized, some smaller, had so far been left untouched by the non-human inhabitants which whom we share the neighborhood though not always compatibly.  At Dr. M’s suggestion, we determined that, this time, we should beat them to the punch, extract the apples from the tree…

And make a pie.

Which I have never made or helped make, though I have observed pies being made in the past, and have most happily eaten the results.

At this point, let me inject a word about me and cooking.  Knowing I am in trouble here, whatever I say. 

In other writings, I have described myself as a member of an identifiable cohort that I have labeled, “The Men Who Lost Dinner.”  It’s a generational thing, by which I mean that in every generation throughout history – except mine – the women prepared dinner, and the men ate it.

It’s different now.

And to be honest, though that “change” is no longer recent, the consequent disorientation has not entirely worn off.  (It takes time when there’s a behavioral alteration dating back to when Eve cooked for Adam.)

You know, bigots – I like to bring in bigots to make me sound less disgusting by comparison – not meaning to be any kind of an apologist and certainly not for the “Implacables”, but some people were once bigots of one sort or another, they eventually saw the light, or had “the light” shone very powerfully in their eyes, and they changed.

But not overnight. 

Just because something is right does not mean the relocation to that position is immediate and automatic.  There’s a necessary “adjustment period” required.  And then, hopefully, you move on.

That is, more or less, me and cooking.  I am gradually (some might say too gradually) getting the picture.

So when I’m invited to join in the baking of a pie, I am skeptical, but unscoffing. 

“Let’s do it”, I reply.  (Almost entirely sincerely.)

And so we do.  Me, donning a protective apron with a Passover motif – it’s a matzo-designed print – and off we go.

Acknowledging an imbalance in our experience, I am inevitably the sous-chef, hauling out ingredients, leveling the measurements with the flat side of a knife (to insure accuracy), rinsing off utensils that will be needed again, and, my most challenging responsibility – peeling the apples.

Although we have a specific apple peeling apparatus, neither of us knows how to use it.  So I employ a carrot scraper instead.  It works acceptably well on the larger apples, but on the smaller ones…

INJURY REPORT  I slice the underside of my left, middle finger, which I immediately self-medicate with Neosporin and a Band-Aid. 

INJURY UPDATE:  I will not miss any games.  And, in fact, I returned courageously to this one.  Though reassigned to less dangerous activities.  (Turning on the oven.)

In the meantime, the chef, consulting two cookbooks, did all the fancy work.  Which included preparing the crust.  (Recently Learned Cooking Tip:  Hardened butter is recommended to hold ingredients together and avoid “crust crackage.”)

We work easily as a team – efficient, cooperative, productive and cheerful.  The entire effort (not counting the baking) takes an hour-an-a-half.  But to be honest, it felt like… I won’t lie to you.  It felt like an hour-and-a-half. 

There was something special about the collaboration.  I don’t know, it’s like there’s this natural, age-adjusted progression created for couples:

You start out – you produce children.  When you're done with that, you remodel your house.  When your house is finished, you take extended vacations.  And now…

A new pleasure of its own kind.

And in the end…

You get a pie.

*  We ate some of it.

"Follow-up To 'Complaining'"

As I was writing yesterday’s post about how the people who run baseball have deteriorated the quality of the World Series – by making it take place almost a month too late, and by requiring a “World Series-Only” alteration of the rules – it came to my attention how many – and perhaps all – of the changes in the presentation of the game are a direct and inevitable consequence of baseball’s unilateral efforts to maximize its profits.

Immediate Disclaimer:  I am not a Communist.  Or a Socialist.  To be honest, I do not even know the difference between those two.   And I believe that a real Communist or Socialist would. 

I often use – or imagine using – this analogy:  If one person is six-foot-five and another person is six-foot-three, does that make the six-foot-three person “short”?

The answer to that semi-rhetorical question is “No.”  When somebody is more of something and somebody else is marginally less of it, that does not make the person who is marginally less of it “the opposite.”  (Cable news commentators take note.)

I am still a Capitalist.  Just not as single-minded a Capitalist as Major League Baseball. 

Aside from what they did to the World Series – putting profit ahead of personal integrity and the love of the game – let’s examine Major League Baseball’s overall record, to determine, through its actions, if Major League Baseball believes that, paraphrasing the words of iconic Packers coach Vince Lombardi,

“Money isn’t everything.  It’s the only thing.”

Years ago, Major League Baseball got rid of “Doubleheaders.”  “Doubleheaders” offered two games for the price of one.  For Major League Baseball, financially, one game for the price of one was better.  So, good-bye “Doubleheaders.” 

Major League Baseball expanded the number of teams from 16 to 30.  All new team owners are required to pay “Entry Fees” of millions of dollars, thus increasing the earlier owners’ coffers, which is primarily why expansion occurred. 

Baseball, of course, can claim that they expanded to more cities to provide access to fans who were geographically excluded from attending the games.   

They did it for the fans.

Perhaps. 

But should attendance in that location be disappointing, baseball feels no compunction about uprooting that team and relocating it somewhere else, claiming now to care deeply about those fans.

As mentioned yesterday, in 1973, to increase the offense in the game and hopefully raise interest (and attendance), the American League instituted the “Designated Hitter Rule” (wherein a “Designated Hitter” bats for the pitcher), but the National League did not.  (Maintaining the purity, integrity and natural balance of the game.) 

What happened? 

I do not know overall what happened, but in 2014, the National League’s attendance was almost three thousand fans per game higher than the American League’s. 

Designate hit that, Purity of the Game Wreckers!  As Louie De Palma used to say, “Nyeh!”

(And then, as also mentioned yesterday, the disastrous consequence of that decision – the flip-flopping of the “DH Rule”, during the course of the World Series.  This is unadulterated insanity. 

What if the “Designated Hitter” is the American League contender’s most essential player?  During World Series games played in National League venues, they cannot even use him, the player who arguably propelled them to “The Big Dance”, now relegated to talented “cheerleader”, while a pitcher, who perhaps has never once batted in his professional career, is forced to embarrass himself, whiffing helplessly at 98 mile-per-hour fastballs.)

For television purposes – baseball, acceding to TV’s needs in exchange for lucrative contract money – all World Series games are played at night (further coldening, as mentioned previously, the already chilly playing conditions of late October/early November, created by, let’s see…

Increasing the number of games played per season…

Abandoning “Doubleheaders”, thus extending the season further…

And extending the season even more by adding a three tiered post-season playoff format.  

Financially induced “Night Baseball” also increases the likelihood that young baseball enthusiasts who live in the Eastern Time Zone (and possibly even the Central Time Zone) will be asleep during the entire playing of the Series.

Business is supposed to try to maximize its profits ostensibly by serving its customers.  If, however, business maximizes its profits while simultaneously dis-serving its customers, there is, I submit, something askew in the system, a counter-productive conflict of interest that inevitably serves nobody. 

Do these ultimate dis-services affect Major League Baseball?  For an answer to that question, I offer a comparison of recent modest World Series television ratings to the burgeoning ratings of Yesteryear. 

I know.  There are more channels today.  But there are the same number of “more channels” when the Super Bowl is on.  And the Super Bowl is gigantic!

You know why?  (At least partly.)

Because they do not play the Super Bowl in August.   As I was writing yesterday’s post about how the people who run baseball have deteriorated the quality of the World Series – by making it take place almost a month too late, and by requiring a “World Series-Only” alteration of the rules – it came to my attention how many – and perhaps all – of the changes in the presentation of the game are a direct and inevitable consequence of baseball’s unilateral efforts to maximize its profits.

Immediate Disclaimer:  I am not a Communist.  Or a Socialist.  To be honest, I do not even know the difference between those two.   And I believe that a real Communist or Socialist would. 

I often use – or imagine using – this analogy:  If one person is six-foot-five and another person is six-foot-three, does that make the six-foot-three person “short”?

The answer to that semi-rhetorical question is “No.”  When somebody is more of something and somebody else is marginally less of it, that does not make the person who is marginally less of it “the opposite.”  (Cable news commentators take note.)

I am still a Capitalist.  Just not as single-minded a Capitalist as Major League Baseball. 

Aside from what they did to the World Series – putting profit ahead of personal integrity and the love of the game – let’s examine Major League Baseball’s overall record, to determine, through its actions, if Major League Baseball believes that, paraphrasing the words of iconic Packers coach Vince Lombardi,

“Money isn’t everything.  It’s the only thing.”

Years ago, Major League Baseball got rid of “Doubleheaders.”  “Doubleheaders” offered two games for the price of one.  For Major League Baseball, financially, one game for the price of one was better.  So, good-bye “Doubleheaders.” 

Major League Baseball expanded the number of teams from 16 to 30.  All new team owners are required to pay “Entry Fees” of millions of dollars, thus increasing the earlier owners’ coffers, which is primarily why expansion occurred. 

Baseball, of course, can claim that they expanded to more cities to provide access to fans who were geographically excluded from attending the games.   

They did it for the fans.

Perhaps. 

But should attendance in that location be disappointing, baseball feels no compunction about uprooting that team and relocating it somewhere else, claiming now to care deeply about those fans.

As mentioned yesterday, in 1973, to increase the offense in the game and hopefully raise interest (and attendance), the American League instituted the “Designated Hitter Rule” (wherein a “Designated Hitter” bats for the pitcher), but the National League did not.  (Maintaining the purity, integrity and natural balance of the game.) 

What happened? 

I do not know overall what happened, but in 2014, the National League’s attendance was almost three thousand fans per game higher than the American League’s. 

Designate hit that, Purity of the Game Wreckers!  As Louie De Palma used to say, “Nyeh!”

(And then, as also mentioned yesterday, the disastrous consequence of that decision – the flip-flopping of the “DH Rule”, during the course of the World Series.  This is unadulterated insanity. 

What if the “Designated Hitter” is the American League contender’s most essential player?  During World Series games played in National League venues, they cannot even use him, the player who arguably propelled them to “The Big Dance”, now relegated to talented “cheerleader”, while a pitcher, who perhaps has never once batted in his professional career, is forced to embarrass himself, whiffing helplessly at 98 mile-per-hour fastballs.)

For television purposes – baseball, acceding to TV’s needs in exchange for lucrative contract money – all World Series games are played at night (further coldening, as mentioned previously, the already chilly playing conditions of late October/early November, created by, let’s see…

Increasing the number of games played per season…

Abandoning “Doubleheaders”, thus extending the season further…

And extending the season even more by adding a three tiered post-season playoff format.  

Financially induced “Night Baseball” also increases the likelihood that young baseball enthusiasts who live in the Eastern Time Zone (and possibly even the Central Time Zone) will be asleep during the entire playing of the Series.

Business is supposed to try to maximize its profits ostensibly by serving its customers.  If, however, business maximizes its profits while simultaneously dis-serving its customers, there is, I submit, something askew in the system, a counter-productive conflict of interest that inevitably serves nobody. 

Do these ultimate dis-services affect Major League Baseball?  For an answer to that question, I offer a comparison of recent modest World Series television ratings to the burgeoning ratings of Yesteryear. 

I know.  There are more channels today.  But there are the same number of “more channels” when the Super Bowl is on.  And the Super Bowl is gigantic!

You know why?  (At least partly.)

Because they do not play the Super Bowl in August.