Apologia for A Game of Thrones

If you are curious about the book series A Song of Ice and Fire by George R.R. Martin or the HBO series Game of Thrones but haven't looked into either, please read and consider.

Over a month ago I was sitting in a theatre with Kayla, waiting for a play to start, and I overheard a guy and a girl, both around our age, a couple of rows behind me, talking about A Game of Thrones. Neither had read it, and yet the guy was explaining to the girl that A Game of Thrones is an enjoyable book, but not a good one. Amused and skeptical, the girl asked him what he meant by this. The guy explained how he would read the book and probably enjoy it, but it’s not, you know, a good book. This, I took to mean, a book of “literary” merit, a James Joyce, if you will, or an Alice Munro.

Their talk then wandered to other things so I stopped eavesdropping, but I kept turning this exchange over in my head. Apart from my fierce loyalty to the book and indignation on its behalf rearing up, especially because this guy didn’t even read the damn thing, I was troubled by the distinction he made. It was a pretty half-baked literary theory, but I knew exactly what he was talking about. Some books are like junk food, delicious and full of empty calories, while others you read for deeper nourishment, books about Serious Things, like Society and Injustice and Humanity and all that. But those apparently aren’t the books one enjoys reading. Mark Twain famously said that "a classic is something everybody wants to have read, but no one wants to read." But does it have to be this way in all cases? Can’t a book be both nutritious and delicious?

I don’t know if this individual is an example of a widespread assumption, or if he’s the exception, but I must respond. For one, the Fantasy genre is already much maligned, and ignorant opinions like his aren’t helping. Furthermore, I’m worried about the fact that A Game of Thrones is so wildly popular that people assume there’s no way it could have any lasting literary value, since popular obviously means low-brow and crass, right? I don’t think this snobbery toward the series is widespread--in fact I know people have more sense than that--but I’d like to nip it in the bud in case it becomes an epidemic. And this goes for  plenty of other books, too: don’t let the New York Times Bestseller status fool you. Popular fiction can also be great literature. An “enjoyable” book can also be a “good” book.

Here are a few reasons why I think that guy was wrong, and A Game of Thrones is well written.

Depth of Character

One thing the descriptions on the backside of the jacket don’t touch on is any evidence of sympathetic characters. In fact, this book is full of them, and I may have picked it up sooner had I known that, yet all the cover talks about is how cold and harsh these people are. This may be true, but it is only half the truth. No writer could get far without characters the reader can care about. A story’s protagonists don’t have to be totally innocent or heroic; far from it, they can be quite flawed. The ones we’re rooting for in A Game of Thrones are a mixed bag, without a doubt, but since you’re seeing it from their perspective you still tend to root for them.

Martin is very good at depicting human beings in very morally ambiguous situations, where the right choice is not always clear. The tension between love and honour, duty and passion, political idealism and realpolitik; these are central themes in the book. Some might say this complexity is a step in the right direction for Fantasy, a genre plagued by a half-deserved reputation for two-dimensional heroes and demonic, hooded bad guys. Depth of character is not easy to execute, but Martin pulls it off with great skill.

At first I was irritated by Sansa. She seemed shallow and childish, even for someone so young. But then I realised she was written this way for a good reason, as it creates a stronger effect when her fortunes change and her world is effectively turned upside down, hung from a tree and smashed to bits like a piñata. Eventually I was won over by her chapters and her unique point of view.

And then there’s Tyrion: the Playboy of Westeros. It’s not clear whose side he’s on; Tyrion is on Tyrion’s side. He’s self-centred, narcissistic, and pretty foul-mouthed, but you love to love him. But there are moments where his kindness, wisdom, and vulnerability shine through that give him depth as well as dastardly charm, making him one of the most intriguing characters in the book.

Voice

Martin shifts point of view in each chapter, but maintains a strong grasp on the narrative voice for each one. Although it is told from the third person, each chapter retains the flavour of its protagonist. Tyrion’s narratives sound a little bit like Tyrion, almost think like Tyrion. The same for Jon, Daenerys, and Catelyn. You would not mistake the narrative voice in Sansa’s chapters, which has the vocabulary and emotional depth of a naïve young girl who dreams of courtly life, for that of Eddard Stark’s, which sound more like a grim war veteran who longs for a simple life. The cast of characters is pretty massive, but you never forget who's talking, and whose shoulder you're peering over. These characters are strategically placed at different points in the time and space of this vast epic, but they are certainly more than a pair of eyes. They are al active participants; each one is fighting tooth and nail for their life, or for what they believe in.

History



One technique I find very effective in creating a sense of verisimilitude in fantasy is the way the characters speak of their shared history: the Rebellion, the Targaryen Dynasty, the Battle of the Trident. These are pivotal moments in the lives of every single character, they are brought up frequently, and yet we never actually witness them first hand. A different writer may have used the literary device of flashbacks, and yet Martin's deliberate withholding of them paradoxically makes the world more real. If it were done with flashbacks, I would feel as though the events existed only for the story, and not for their own sake. As I've said before, I want to feel like a fantasical world will keep existing, long after I've read the last page, and I think Martin achieves this. It is subtle, and it trusts the reader’s ability to piece it together on his own.


Dialogue

A great deal of dialogue in the HBO series was lifted straight from the book itself. This is a testament to Martin’s talent for writing sharp dialogue that reveals character and moves the story along. It helps that Martin used to write for TV, but his background lends itself to the novel form all the same.

Drama

Speaking of his screenwriting experience, it’s no better shown than in his ability to write highly dramatic chapters. The book is very, very long, but it is without longueur: in each chapter, something always happens. There is always significance, whether it’s subtle, or whether it knees you in the codpiece. He is especially good at chapter endings. They aren’t exactly cliff-hangers--nothing as gimmicky as that--they always have a dramatic punch to them. The book is so readable because it’s always moving forward. The pace may vary, and we may take the scenic route at times (we can’t always be galloping at breakneck speed atop our destriers, direwolves at our side), but we are always moving.

Details

Martin is known for immersing himself in the subject he is researching. The fruits of his study are abundant on every page. But never does this become pedantic. The book is not a place for him to flaunt his (though considerable) knowledge of medieval European culture, and though that culture is the inspiration, every detail is employed in service to the story. To this Martin is loyal to a fault, but you could have much, much worse faults in a writer than that, couldn’t you?

Conclusion

I’m not saying the book is flawless. You might even be able to argue the opposite of everything I just said. But at least let it be well-informed. And perhaps this is a useless exercise, trying to prop up an already very successful series (I've seen more people reading A Song of Ice and Fire on public transit these days than any other series of books, including Fifty Shades of Grey). I’m glad it’s getting all this hype, but I have yet to see anybody since perhaps its original reviewers take a close look at the writing and evaluate its merits, the book itself at the heart of this mania.

To be honest, I haven’t read the rest of the series. I’ve only just begun A Clash of Kings, so I can only speak for the very first installment. But it puzzles me that people don’t seem to consider if they enjoyed a work, there must be some merit to it. Even if you didn’t like parts of it, maybe it had enough imaginative power to carry you through. Say, for example, you thought a book’s dialogue was corny, or the metaphors were lazy. But if you liked it, perhaps its strength lies in its inventiveness or its humour.

You liked a book? You weren’t bored by it? You were even emotionally invested in it? Well, my friend, there is a reason. That is the direct result of the conscious efforts of an author searching for just the fitting detail, the perfect turn of phrase, the mot juste, all with the precision of a sculptor. And it may have flaws, but after thousands and thousands of pages of gripping drama of a high order, a damn good yarn enriched by painstaking research, all done over the span of twenty years and counting, you can’t accuse Mr. Martin of the laziness you might find in a lesser writer.

Dickens’s books are now a part of the Western literary canon, yet he was very much a writer of “popular” fiction, striving to entertain rather than baffle his readers with the kind of code-language you might find in Ulysses. This also says something about the marketing of books, the way they are divided into “Literature” and “Fiction” at bookstores and libraries. This is an organizational method, and it is helpful to an extent, but it’s not a hard science. We’re still talking about books, here. Round pegs and square holes. What I want to draw to people’s attention is the way that it affects our reading choices, and that we miss out on great adventures when we pre-judge a book like this particular fellow did. If only he knew he would incur the long-winded wrath of this blogger, perhaps he would have kept his trap shut. He’s just lucky it was me who heard him, and not someone like Khal Drogo, or the Mad King Aerys. Don’t know the reference? You should probably read the book.

What Makes a Great Trailer?

It’s summer, the season of the blockbuster. But I don’t want to talk about summer blockbusters. I want to talk about the things that make you want to watch them.

After leaving the movie theatre with my friends a couple of months ago, the subject of trailers came up. I asked, innocently enough, if there were any awards for them. None of us knew for certain, but we agreed if there weren’t there certainly ought to be.* ‘Cause come on, who doesn’t love a good trailer?

A bad one certainly isn’t going to draw in as many crowds. A great deal of editing and selection goes into them, which takes skill and artistry. So it stands to reason we can find some sort of criteria for what makes a good trailer. I can think of one thing I really don’t like in a trailer, which is when they give way too much away. I’m sure we can all recall trailers we’ve seen that were basically a two-minute plot summary; we almost don’t even need to see the real thing, and when we do, our suspicions are confirmed.

That’s not to say that bad trailer equals bad movie. I thought the King’s Speech was a great movie, even though its trailer was far too generous. By the same token, there are some amazing trailers to some very mediocre films out there. (And then there’s the occasion when the trailer sets your expectations low, and the movie hits the mark.) But even though they merely serve as a window into the world of the movie and not the movie itself, I believe they can be evaluated as self-contained piece. It may just be the cheap thrill of an advertisement (but let’s admit it: there are some fantastic commercials out there). You might also call it a simple pleasure.

So now, just for fun, here is a (by no means definitive) list of of some of my favourite trailers that I can recall. Some are recent, some are a few years old, and some are upcoming. Enjoy!

Watchmen 

I did enjoy this movie, although I didn’t care for the directing style, and felt a lot of the dialogue just didn’t transfer well from page to screen. But my first real introduction to the movie was through the trailer. What worked here was the almost complete lack of dialogue or voiceover, plus the sombre and menacing “The End is the Beginning is the End” by the Smashing Pumpkins playing throughout. It gives you brief moments of things to come, but it’s all out of order, so unless you’d read the book beforehand, you probably had no idea what the story was just by watching the trailer. And that didn’t matter one bit.

Delicatessen

For some reason I wasn't able to post the video directly on here, so a link will have to do. But trust me, it's worth it. This trailer tells us almost nothing about the story. It establishes the people who live in this world, and their, um, daily rhythms, but no conflict. And yet somehow it doesn’t need it. These two minutes are enough to make you say “What the...what?” and you’re sold.

Super 8

After establishing the characters through brief lines of dialogue, the second half focuses almost exclusively on the characters’ reactions in light of the frightening and wondrous; this trailer keeps us guessing till the end, and effectively captures the spirit of mystery and adventure the way an homage to early Spielberg should.

Across the Universe




I can’t express in words how excited I was when I first saw the trailer for this. In a way it ended up committing the sin of telling the entire story in chronological order, but since the movie rambled on like a series of loosely connected music videos, the trailer was almost more effective in telling a clear and succinct story. This is a perfect example of a trailer I loved for a movie I did not care for.

Funny Games




This is one movie I haven’t actually seen. The music choice might be a bit over-used, but there’s something about Edvard Grieg’s mischievous and iconic “In the Hall of the Mountain King” set up in sharp contrast to quick snapshots of terror and violence and bold, red captions. It's essentially a full-scale assault your senses, but your inner masochist kinda likes it.

Tree of Life

This trailer is rich in imagery and sublime music. The movie is a sprawling, two and a half hour odyssey (one critic aptly described it as “impressionistic”), and unless you’re a hard-core Terrence Malick aficionado, it’s not the kind of film you can watch over and over again. The trailer, on the other hand, is (and I have found myself watching it multiple times). Whatever you think of Malick’s latest opus, the trailer itself is very effective in drawing you in. 

The Great Gatsby

You can always count on Baz Luhrmann to take bold risks with the stories he tells. The trailers opens with scenes of Jazz-era New York, underscored with contemporary music that captures the spirit of the affluence of the 1920’s without being slavish to the form. A brief narration (Tobey Maguire as Nick Carraway) sets up the premise, and then we see shots of the main characters, and (unless you read the book in high school) from there we can piece together who loves whom and that shit’s gonna hit the fan, though we might not know exactly what and how.

The Dark Knight Rises

How could I talk about trailers and not mention this summer’s most anticipated movie? I’ll concede that this trailer works so well in part because of the anticipation built up over the last four years, but I dare you to watch this trailer and not pee your pants a little. 

The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey 




Okay, maybe it’s not always possible to judge a trailer entirely separate from the story it inspired. The fact that The Hobbit is one of my favourite books definitely made me enjoy this trailer more than if I’d never read it. But once again, even though I do know the story, the trailer is mercifully lacking in exposition. An old wizardly fellow named Gandalf invites a hobbit named Bilbo Baggins on an adventure, and then he lists thirteen dwarves, and then they start singing. There is a brief montage as the music swells, and just a touch of dialogue, and it’s enough to give you goosebumps. However the actual movie turns out, this trailer certainly did its job.

So that's it for now. What are your favourite trailers?

*As it turns out there are awards for trailers, called the Golden Trailer Awards. If you’re curious about their selections, check out their website.

Report: 2 Months in TO

At this moment I am sitting in the massive Toronto Reference Library, by a window that overlooks the bustle of the streets Yonge and Bloor, on a windy and overcast day. I like it here--for the most part. When I left Victoria, there were some people I spoke to who could not understand why I would ever want to leave, especially for big ol’ smoggy Toronto. Of course I miss Victoria. The air is certainly fresher there, for one. It takes less time to get around. I have a lot of fond memories of Victoria, being the home of my alma mater and all. But after two months, Toronto hasn’t killed me yet, (though certainly not for lack of trying). In fact, I dare say I’ve even enjoyed myself. If nothing else, there’s certainly never a dull moment here.

In this post I want to give you a brief glimpse of my experiences in my new home, thus far.

Getting Around

The drivers here seem to be angry, angry people. I’ve never heard so many horns honked in one place at one time (i.e. any major intersection in the city). I’m fairly content not having a car, but I am especially glad I don’t have one here. I'm terrified enough of being a pedestrian, and I’m from a big city, too. Furthermore, this place ranks pretty low in the biker-friendly arena, exacerbated by a mayor who simply does not give a flying you-know-what for two-wheelers, of which there are many. This place is full of cyclists, which is good, but there's very little infrastructure afforded them, and even less goodwill from motorists. I know cyclists can be a pain, but remember, drivers: you are bigger than them in your 4000 pound hunks of moving metal--they are more afraid of you than you are of them.

Transit is a mixed bag. At a whopping $126 it costs over forty dollars more for a monthly transit pass than it did in Victoria. We are not amused. Unfortunately, and strangely enough, Toronto has one of the least publicly funded transit systems in the country. But besides that I have yet to be really frustrated with the service here. Buses, trains and streetcars are more or less punctual, and I find something strangely romantic about riding the subway. It’s kind of dirty, it’s dim, and it has that quintessentially big-city quality to it. Plus, I've come across some amazing buskers down in the stations, playing accordions, pianos, cellos, and of course, guitars. 

And then there are the recorded voices used to announce the stops. The old trains use a voice I like to call Margot, a middle-aged woman who always sounds reserved, and rather bored, and almost certainly took deep drags from her cigarette between takes in the recording studio; the newer trains ring with the voice of Cindy, who sounds like a sexy young robot, the kind 2001: A Space Odyssey's HAL might want to date. Margot and Cindy always cheer me up, in their own ways. Also, I love the sounds that reverberate all around underground stations: the echo of footsteps on the platform when it’s half-empty, the otherworldly howl and throb of wind from deep in the tunnels, the rumble of an approaching train, like a giant metal worm in a cave...I dunno, I’m weird like that.

Talkin' about the Weather

Yes, there’s the smog. It’s mostly noticeable on the really hot days. The dull, oppressive haze above, and the hot garbage-y vapours wafting up from lodes of sewage beneath your feet. And the heat. My God, the heat. Cold showers are a necessity, sometimes more than once a day. You can’t really do anything on those days, as almost everything requires too much heat-inducing physical effort. (On days like that it’s best just to hang out in an air-conditioned library!) Nights offer no relief, either. Today, and for the past week it’s cooled down, but who knows how long it will last. It’s unbearable, and it makes everyone cranky. Yet somehow I still don’t mind. And except for those days when the divine ant-bully in the sky focuses his mighty magnifying glass on our lowly hill, the weather’s been wunderbar.

Sights

One guy I spoke to about Toronto said it was just a concrete jungle (this man was the definition of curmudgeon, but he had more experience in the city than I did, so who was I to contradict him?) I was told if I left Victoria for Toronto I would lament the loss of being surrounded by natural beauty. Certainly I miss Victoria’s fecundity, but you’d be wrong to think nothing green grows here. There are several lovely parks in and around town: Trinity-Bellwoods Park, Queens Park, and the vast High Park, which I haven’t even been to yet. 

My apartment overlooks the lush canopies of the neighbourhood called Forest Hill, and I’m about a 20 minute walk from Casa Loma, a castle in the middle of the city that could put Victoria’s Craigdarroch Castle to shame (Casa Loma is also where Scott Pilgrim battles Lucas Lee, one of Ramona Flowers’s evil ex-boyfriends). The older neighbourhoods are made up of beautiful, narrow red brick houses, with tree-lined streets. Greenery abounds, right in and among the “concrete jungle”. Even downtown places like Queen Street West and Ossington have some amazing graffiti. (Imagine: a city covered in the most astounding graffiti, instead of obnoxious ads. Alas, 'tis but a dream.)

No sir, this place is not without its gems. There’s Kensington Market, which I imagine is actually just a few streets lifted up from Salt Spring Island, carried over by helicopter and dropped in the middle of Toronto. It’s full of vendors selling clothes, books, music, food and other wares on the sidewalks; prayer-flags float on the breeze in the front yards like clotheslines; punks, hippies and hipsters alike mingle in the streets. There’s the sprawling U of T campus, just on the edge of downtown, with gorgeous 19th century architecture, like the Hart House Theatre, and the Royal Ontario Museum, an old-world edifice that looks like it was hit by an alien space ship, or perhaps the All-Spark of Cybertron. It’s a bit kooky, but why not? 

And the libraries. We can’t forget the libraries. I must admit Vancouver’s downtown library is a far cooler design for a main branch, but with its open, curvaceous quality the Toronto Reference Library is not without its elegance and charm (it’s good enough for citizen-of-the-world Alberto Manguel to praise in his book A History of Reading, and he’s seen his share of libraries). And there’s the fact of sheer quantity: Toronto has nearly a hundred branches. Victoria had eight. 

Downtown

Then there’s downtown itself. Unlike Calgary, this core doesn’t shut down after 9 pm. But like Calgary it’s full of Suits running around, doing Important Things and feeling very very Important. And oh! The hot dog vendors! I’ve never seen so many. If only I still ate meat/liked veggie dogs...and then there’s the garish and hyper-consumerist Yonge-Dundas Square, which is actually a fun place to be, though a little overstimulating. The last time I was there I saw two old men playing chess at a table--not the most idyllic setting for it, but endearing all the same, a kind of hub of stillness and calm amid the neon whirlwind. And when you get bored of watching the large digital ads on repeat, the fire-and-brimstone preachers with microphones never fail to entertain. 

I dare not imagine what Freud would say about my fondness for tall buildings, but I do think it has something to do with awe, feeling so small beside something so large, whether it’s manmade or not, looking straight up a high structure with a sense of the irrational threat of it folding in on itself (à la Inception), even toppling over and crushing you. I must admit I am fond of urban landscapes, when they’re done well. The environmentalist in me laments their existence (buildings being the number one emitter of carbon dioxide in the world), but the kid in me was kind of hoping for more, or at least more densely packed ones. Except for the financial district, downtown Toronto is fairly spread out, and every time I look up I can’t help but wonder if Spider-man would be able to sling his webs with ease here. New York has way more skyscrapers and they’re much closer together, making for comfortable swing-time for Spidey. In Toronto, I’m less sure. I fear he may try and swing away from downtown, only to hit the ground and be dragged along by his web before he reached the next high-rise. I think about these things quite a lot, you see.

Anything Else?

So is that it? Are these the reasons why I came here? Surely there must be something else? 

Why else did I come here? Well, let me think...

Tarragon. Factory. Passe-Muraille. Soulpepper. CanStage. Buddies in Bad Times. Necessary Angel. Mirvish. Lower Ossington Theatre. Summerworks. Fringe Festival. TIFF. Luminato (where I saw Rufus Wainwright do a faaabulous--and free--outdoor concert). NXNE. Second City. Massey Hall. Toronto Jazz Festival. The ROM. The Art Gallery of Ontario. CBC headquarters. Dozens and dozens of bookstores (Theatre Books, a bookstore dedicated entirely to the performing arts). The largest Pride celebration in North America. Oh yes, and just a couple hours drive away from Stratford. 

That’s why.

The biggest downside is the employment situation. Or the lack thereof. Jobs are tough to get here. Well, jobs that I, Liam Volke, BFA, actually qualify for. But I can hardly blame that on an entire city as a single entity. Still, it’s frustrating. But let’s just say it builds character. I haven’t lost hope, but I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t a slog. Thankfully I have Kayla with me, and even a handful of new friends I’ve made from working on the play Top Gun! The Musical. It’s not always friendly to the wallet, but it’s awfully nice having an actual social life again, after being such a homebody in Vic. Even better is that feeling of support, which makes all the difference when you’re living in a new world.

There are plenty of other reasons why I like it here, like the ethnic diversity, the hundreds of pizza joints, the fabled friendly Torontonians (they do exist! In blessedly large numbers, too). But I think what I like best is the total feeling I get. It’s open, it’s overflowing with life, and I am young enough to enjoy and thrive on the energy. It may care not a jot that I’m here, but I’ll take it anyway. Even if I didn’t end up liking it, I simply had to find out for myself. The rest of Canada can have it’s opinion about this place. But this is, thus far, the greatest experiment of my life, not someone else’s.

*

*Except for the picture of the concert, the busker, and Spider-man, every photo was taken and provided by the lovely Kayla Sankey.

In the Market for a Cause

The world is a messed up place. Just glance at any newspaper, which take such pains to remind us: the bloody struggle in Syria, robo-calls, the controversial Kony2012 campaign (and by extension, the LRA), the abhorred Enbridge pipeline. And these are only the current events, the timely ones. Poverty, racism, bullying, climate change, a crippled education system, homophobia, xenophobia, Islamophobia--I could go on for, well, just about ever. But my intention is not to depress anybody. Rather, it is to illustrate the diversity of problems we must face and overcome if we are to make this world, in some small way, a better place.

Before I continue, let me clarify. If you don’t believe we can make the world a better place so there’s no need to bother trying, then the following will be of no interest to you. If, however, you look at the status quo and you don’t like what you see and you do think it’s worth the time to at least try to improve matters, then we have something to talk about. If you believe it takes an organized effort to bring about change to make the world more open-minded, compassionate and sustainable, and you want to be a part of that change, then consider yourself an activist, and let’s get to work. But what happens when you are a free agent? An activist-for-hire, as it were?

Information

Thanks to current technology we live in an age of information; we have more ways of finding out about what’s going on in our world than we could have ever dreamed of before. We don’t know what to do with all of this information, and that’s something I would like to address. Harold Bloom has asked the question in at least two of his books: in an age of information, where is wisdom to be found? We don’t really know what to do with the vast landfill the internet has become, for example. Its variety and its volubility has created this false sense that we are capable of managing it. And yet we’re expected to know instinctively how to manage it.

Rule #1: Stay Informed.

Okay, sure. Sounds reasonable. But exactly what should we be staying informed on? Everything the media throws at us? Sounds daunting. If we are to be the bright and shiny citizens of the 21st century who care deeply about the world, are we expected to be experts on every single topic? Of course not, you might protest. Yet I feel that that common sense isn’t as common as it ought to be. At least not articulated clearly enough. Besides being something a person might do if they wanted to score world-savvy points with their peers, the task of knowing about every current event seems, and probably is, impossible.

Choice

There’s nothing new in pointing out that we have become inundated with choice, at least in the consumer world, and it has not necessarily made us happier. I can certainly say for myself that choice is overwhelming, and the more options there are the less enjoyable the freedom to choose becomes. This is the curse of consumerism, but I think it’s also true in the world of activism, humanitarianism, and social enterprise as well.

As tech-savvy groups have turned to social media to get their ideas across, more and more groups from various different causes have begun competing for our attention, much in the same way businesses compete in the world of commerce. We are living within a vast marketplace of causes, many of them noble, all of them vying for our awareness, for our money, and for our participation. I remember seeing this playing out quite clearly on Victoria’s Earth Walk last year, where there were booths for Students For A Free Tibet, The Canadian Tibetan Society, Amnesty International, Greenpeace, The Victoria Secular Humanist Society, the Communist Party, the Green Party, and a number of other grassroots activist groups. Many of these groups will argue that it is our moral imperative that we listen to them and follow their advice. Judging from the turn out at the Earth Walk, these groups seem to have roughly the same target demographic, even if their means are different, and sometimes even in direct opposition with one another. Many of them may make equally compelling cases, but I for one don’t have unlimited time and resources to devote to all of them, so I have to be selective, right?

The question is, in an age of various competing causes, how does a person decide which horse to bet on?

With so many delicious problems to choose from, how do we know which one is the most urgent, or the most crucial? For some people this is a no-brainer. Perhaps a person has lost a loved one to drugs and alcohol, or has recovered from them, so they feel compelled to help people struggling with substance abuse. Their imperative may take the form of volunteering, or it may become a career, leading them to become a social worker, police officer, doctor, teacher, or even—yes, even this—a politician. A person may have experienced so much abuse in the workplace that they become involved in labour activism. Or for some, the meat industry (à la Jonathan Safran Foer) is the great dragon to slay. For some people it simply is not a matter of choice. They have lived through events they cannot forget. They have seen things they cannot unsee, and the choice is clear. But what about those of us who haven’t been directly affected by any single major ill, and whose livelihood is, at least by comparison, morally neutral? Are we to wait until one of our loved ones has been beaten by a cop or gotten sick from something the government is dumping in our water, or killed in a massive tsunami? I certainly hope not. Thankfully we have our capacity for empathy and compassion that allows us to imagine what others are feeling.

Shotgun vs. Laser

I do grant that staying informed is an essential starting point to that empathic act. But we must go further. Keeping abreast of current events is like standing in a hallway with many open doors, and peeking inside of each. For some people that’s quite enough, thank you very much. But it seems to me you can’t stay in the hallway forever, if you mean to take action. The next step is to enter a room and spend some time there, which also means forgetting about the other rooms for the time being. This I would call the laser approach (specific, sustained action), as opposed to the shotgun approach (general, inconsistent action). I favour the laser to the shotgun, in theory, at least. I hope the Occupy Movement will stay alive for a long time to come, but one of the biggest issues I had with it (and other more intelligent and better informed people have commented on in greater detail) was that it seemed like an airing of general grievances, so general that it became ineffective. The shotgun is inconsistent, our donations and our petitions signings completely dependent on our whims and our limited awareness of said issue. “1%” can’t even begin to cooperate if we don’t know in specific terms what we want. The shotgun can also be overwhelming, lumping all the world’s problems together into one big hydra. Being a jack-of-all-trades activist is doable, but as a rule it doesn’t offer a person the opportunity to deepen their knowledge of a particular issue and become a more effective agent for change.

Despite everything I just said, I do think we can and should still pay attention to more than one issue; many people in BC who are furious about the toll we’re taking on the environment were also furious about the HST when it was introduced, all the way up till the day it was led to the guillotine. The downside of a strictly laser-like approach is it overlooks the simple fact that many of our world’s problems are deeply interconnected, and to take on one implies taking on many. It also means a lot of other problems must be set aside for the time being. This, I’m afraid, is something we have to accept.

Actually, let me reframe the laser/shotgun analogy. Perhaps it is better to have a shotgun approach in theory, and a laser one in practice. In order to commit to something we must forgive ourselves for excluding the other causes we’re not committing to. As I said before, we have to be mindful of the one we’re currently in, forget the other rooms for the time being, and forgive ourselves for forgetting. Empathy must be extended beyond the self, but it also starts with the self.

Choice, again

But that doesn’t answer the question of whose shoes it is our moral imperative to be walking a mile in. How do I as an individual decide what is the priority, if it is unclear to me? Or at least how do we know where to start? Do we choose the one that is most likely to succeed? or do you choose the one that seems to have been neglected? Or the one closest to home? Or the most urgent? Is it more responsible to focus on the welfare of the Tibetan people, even if it means we don’t concentrate on helping the indigenous peoples in our own country who are living in third world conditions? Do we try to help the homeless in our own streets, or do we focus on the ones living in more extreme poverty on the other side of the globe? Do we try to address inner-city gang violence if the Syrian people is locked in a bloody struggle against its own government, perhaps long after the media spotlight has passed and precious international pressure has been exhausted? Multi-tasking is not good for us, so why would it work with activism?

You’re probably aware, dear reader, that none of this answers the question. You may have even guessed by now that I don’t have an answer. But I think whatever it may be, it lies in the acceptance that you can’t help everybody, all the time. You can’t play God, (even God can’t play God, it seems), so relax. If those of us with the luxury of stepping back can do just that and allow ourselves to let go of all the other problems when the time comes to concrete action, that stepping back frees us from feeling obliged to choose all of them. Deciding may boil down to a person’s interests, or gut instinct about a cause, which ones they see themselves helping. I also think the answer has to do with enjoying it, too. Like work, you have to love what cause you’re investing yourself in. It may also mean accepting that your contribution may not be felt within your lifetime, but that it may be part of a cumulative process, and that any small act will do. The motto think globally, act locally makes great sense within the context of the shotgun/laser approach; in fact it’s just another way of saying the same thing.

Choose something. See what happens. As Joseph Campbell said, "follow your bliss." And while you're at it--I'm sorry for belabouring the point-- forgive yourself for setting aside the others. Take heart in the accomplishments of those who have gone before us: the suffragette movement, the civil rights movement, feminism, the fall of the Soviet Union, the abolition of slavery, children’s rights--I could go on forever, but you get the point. Sure, Martin Luther King Jr. didn’t solve world hunger or broker peace between Israel and Palestine, but I think it’s safe to say that the dream he did have has helped to mend the world in other ways. If the world’s many problems really are interconnected, then whatever you do may have a farther-reaching effect than you might imagine. And the upside is that whatever horse you do bet on—it almost doesn’t matter which—I feel as though it is a million times better than if you don’t bet on one at all.

Here's a website Kayla showed me called Do Something for anybody who wants to do more than sign online petitions to try to make the world a better place, but might not be sure where to start. It looks like it's aimed at teens (which is an excellent idea), but I think it applies to anyone and everyone.

Anywho, enough sermonizing for today. Have a good night!

Liam

I'll post on here very soon. I promise.

Wrestling with the Rottweiler: On Reading Mr. Dawkins

So I finally read the controversial bestseller The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins, two years after I read--and almost unquestioningly accepted--one of its formal rebuttals, Karen Armstrong’s The Case For God. Critics of Armstrong who also happen to be fans of Dawkins may be disappointed that my respect and admiration for Armstrong has not diminished, after reading Dawkins’s work. This is in part because I don’t believe that they’re direct, natural opponents. But I will disagree with Armstrong in her portrayal of Dawkins as overly aggressive or militant. What I have found in Dawkins is a mind as scrupulous as he is unflinching in his search for truth. The God Delusion is full of wit, robust logic, and great passion. There were moments where his contempt for religion nearly overrode the content of his arguments, but the content itself was virtually airtight, especially where it concerned religion’s track record. But again, his love for the natural world is greater than his hatred for the supernatural. I especially felt his love for the reality of the universe that science has unveiled, in the very last segment of the book, titled “The Mother of All Burkas”. But I’ll say no more about whether he takes it too far or not. You should go and read it and decide for yourself.

Theist? Atheist? Agnostic?

I decided to read this book because I felt it would be irresponsible of me not to. I read Armstrong’s response to New Atheism, so it’s only fair to examine New Atheism itself, right? Prompted by The Case for God I’ve spent the past two years reading books on religion, written by believers and nonbelievers alike. I’ve been reading book after book in an attempt to clarify not just what stance is best to take on religion, but exactly what it is I believe to be the truth about existence. I read this book most recently because I have been trying to sort out a very complicated relationship I have with religion and the idea of God.

To say I had lost my faith in God would be inaccurate, because I’m not quite sure I had any to begin with. My history with faith could be characterized by a series of attempts to get it, as though it were something I was lacking. This seems like a good enough indicator to stop trying,yet I’ve been compelled by and attracted to many aspects of religion all the same. Every time I thought I was done with it, something pulled me back. I felt very confused, and didn’t know where to stand. Whether it was faith (whatever that could possibly mean) or merely a sentimental loyalty, this feeling clearly demanded my attention. I felt condemned to agnosticism, and I didn’t particularly like being there, hoping that if I dug just a little deeper, I could discover what notion is enthroned in my psyche. So I wanted to see if ‘Darwin’s Rottweiler’ Richard Dawkins could tip me--poor, indecisive wretch--in the direction of atheism. I wanted to see if he could change my mind. I hoped to test my own views on religion and see if they stood up to the author’s rhetoric. Any God that could be argued away by just a book, I reasoned, was obviously a god I didn’t truly believe in, and not something worth believing in in the first place. Not just considering his arguments, but observing my reaction to his arguments would reveal myself to myself. So reading a book like The God Delusion was a method of honing, sharpening, and clarifying.

Biting Back

I was surprised by it, in a few ways. First, I didn’t expect to enjoy it as much as I did. I’m not a huge fan of polemic, but I must admit it was great fun to read, thanks to the wit and clarity of Dawkins’ prose. The kind of atheism Dawkins espouses is a much more politicized one. He encourages atheists to stand up to the discrimination they face. Atheists and skeptics are not given the same respect afforded to believers in many parts of the world, the uber-religious United States being one of them. Yes, he does outright attack religion in many places (mainly the parts where it sucks), but he wasn’t nearly as aggressive as I thought he would be. He seemed less pugnacious as Sam Harris in The Moral Landscape (and even less so than Hitchens in God is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything). But if his words do seem barbed, you can hardly blame him, seeing as his own profession and everything he’s worked for is itself under threat from religious lobbyists trying to force schools to teach creationism and Intelligent Design alongside evolution. And let’s not forget when he was writing this book, the Bush administration had been halting funding in the U.S. for stem-cell research, a potentially life-saving pursuit. He feels his world--which is also everybody’s, by the way--is under attack. They bite, and he bites back (with pen, sans sword). So, fair enough.

Zeitgeist

But above all, I was also surprised at how much I agreed with him. A lot of his arguments I had at least heard the gist of before (such as were phrased by Comte-Sponville in The Little Book of Atheist Spirituality, and John Shelby Spong in The Sins of Scripture), while other conclusions he made were ones I had arrived at on my own, only to find them articulated better here. For example, I was always troubled by the way people tend to be selective of which parts of the Bible they obey, depending on their own cultural standards. This suggested that people don’t actually derive their morals from the Bible, but rather from standards outside and independent of it. Dawkins covers this in the chapter titled ‘The “Good Book” and the Changing Moral Zeitgeist’:

Remember, all I am trying to establish for the moment is that we do not, as a matter of fact, derive our morals from scripture. Or, if we do, we pick and choose among the scriptures for the nice bits and reject the nasty. But then we must have some independent criterion for deciding which are the moral bits: a criterion which, wherever it comes from, cannot come from scripture itself and is presumable available to all of us whether we are religious or not.

Of course, many religious people today don’t take the Bible literally, and don’t feel as though they have to, in light of the Bible scholarship that has emerged in the past two hundred years. But a non-literal view makes it much trickier to hold on to religion as we know it. Some can manage it, others can’t. I have been trying to find out which camp I belong to, and if God has any meaning left to me. If anything of my spiritual ties to Christianity remains, it has a closer resemblance to Spong’s non-theistic version. And for that reason, I actually found it easy to side with Dawkins on many points.

Religion = Child Abuse

Another point Dawkins raises that’s bothered me so often in the past is the contingency of religious belief. The biggest reason why I might prefer to be a Christian rather than a Muslim or a Rastafarian is because I was raised, more or less, as a Christian, and have lived in a predominantly Christian culture. How unfortunate for those living outside of Christendom! Are they to be damned forever because they weren’t lucky enough to be raised with a bias toward Lord Jesus Christ? More often than not faith is not a choice, so how could a loving God force an impossible choice on us? The habits we’re taught in childhood are incredibly powerful. And what Dawkins wants us to consider is calling a child a “Muslim girl” or a “Christian boy” is as ridiculous as calling one a “Marxist child”. He does not ask people to raise their children as atheists per se, but to raise them to think for themselves and decide what they believe after they’ve learned enough about the world and are mature enough to make that decision on their own. Makes sense to me. At first, I was a little shocked that he went so far as to call indoctrination a form of child abuse, but the more I consider it, the more I realize he’s definitely on to something.

“Gateway Drug” Religion

Religious moderates and religious liberals may resent the way Dawkins lumps them in the same camp as fundamentalists, but he does make a compelling case for doing so, however much it rankles people. One thing he mentions which I hadn’t considered before, and which I find very difficult to shake off, is that even though a religious practice and the doctrine behind it may be perfectly innocuous in most cases, it may lead to more sinister strains, as so many are based on something not based on conclusive evidence, and driven by faith, which doesn’t require evidence. The fact that so many of the 14th Dalai Lama’s followers regard him as a reincarnation of the semi-divine spirit Avalokitesvara makes them vulnerable to all sorts of abuses of power. Thankfully Tenzin Gyatso is an open-minded and compassionate person, and has given up his role as head of the Tibetan government-in-exile, and remains only a head of state and their spiritual leader. This is great, but this lineage is still a gamble, like all monarchies that claim power by divine right. Again, he has done much to bolster the hopes and morale of his people and promote peace throughout the world; I think this can’t be overstated. But while the Tibetans of Dharamsala are more democratically organized now, keep in mind that it took thirteen (Buddhist) predecessors to get to this point. And those ones didn’t seem to mind having all that power.

Credo: A Rough Sketch

If nothing else, I realised from reading this book that I have much more in common with atheists than I do theists: I believe in evolution. I believe the universe came into being 13.7 billion years ago. I believe that human beings are just another form of complex life, one more species among the billions on this planet, and we have an intelligence to which other animals are not entirely restricted, therefore we are not as special in the animal kingdom as we thought. I believe we are capable of uplifting acts of goodness, as well as chilling acts of evil, and neither are necessarily proof of a good or evil will pervading the entire, non-living universe. We are extraordinary, but we are not the be-all and end-all of evolution, because it’s an ongoing story and something better than us will emerge, (if we don’t destroy the planet, that is). I believe in all of these things which we have learned through the scientific method. And if new evidence came along to discredit it all, I would simply have to change my beliefs to suit the facts.

There are theists who believe all these things as well, but where I differ with them is that whatever transcendent experience we can acquire in this lifetime--satori, Grace, Brahman, creative flow--it is not likely to be the result of a Super-intelligence coming in from outside of our universe and deliberately injecting us with Himself. Whatever divinity is, it probably comes from within us, not from Elsewhere. Also, I don’t believe in the literal Virgin Birth, Resurrection, or any other such miracles, any more than I believe in the literal virgin birth of the Buddha or the literal resurrection of Osiris.

I can’t express how tempted I am to think in theistic terms, but if I were to be ruthlessly honest I would have to admit that there is no proof that our access to enlightenment is caused by Someone Else. I believe our focus on the hereafter is a threat to the good that comes from the here and now: this is the only good we’ve known, because now is all we have. There’s a reason our visions of heaven resemble Earth but shinier; it’s the only point of reference we have. C.S. Lewis’ assertion that because nothing on earth could satisfy his deepest longing implied there must be something beyond this world that does is unconvincing, though extremely attractive. It feels redundant to state these empirically verified beliefs, because I’ve held them for a long time now. But this book confronts me with them, and reminds me that to accept these things as truth and then adopt a worldview not based on them is irresponsible and lazy.

“To you be your religion; to me, mine.”

What I also appreciated about this book is that Dawkins cuts admirably through all the moral relativism that floats around in secular society. In a culture where it’s more P.C. to say ‘I don’t agree with you’ than to say ‘your argument is wrong’, I’m kind of impressed by his brass. If a Christian believes that only through accepting Jesus can we be saved, then this belief implies the corollary that souls of non-believers are in mortal danger.

He may not admit it in polite conversation, but it’s there. And yet I can’t even count how many conversations I’ve had that have shied away from it, out of politeness, or politics. Of course, a Christian can also believe in another person’s right to disagree. But that same person believes in a God who presides over believers and non-believers alike. It’s the same with an atheist. Even if an atheist says “You can believe what you like, I don’t agree with you,” he is implying that he thinks the other person’s worldview is false. We associate argument with discord and aggression, but it can have positive benefits as well. Being goaded into a kind of intellectual sparring match can helps us to clarify what it is we're defending. In arguing "your views are incorrect and here is why..." he forces readers to be really honest with themselves.

Let’s Talk

Attacking, demonizing and belittling the other side is obviously no solution. As the religion debate is enflamed more and more every day, I think we’ve got to be as compassionate and respectful as possible as we attempt to carry on a dialogue. Of course, it is difficult to hold a conversation when the other side is wholly devoted to your annihilation. But even in more peaceful company there is a danger in simply saying ‘you have your beliefs and I have mine’, agreeing to disagree and then going off and living in one's own hermetically sealed worlds. Living so subjectively makes it nearly impossible to speak meaningfully about anything, and we start to teeter over into nihilism. I think by taking a bolder stance on the matter Dawkins is trying to call our attention to that danger. Just because, as the truism goes, truth is subjective, it doesn't mean we aren't allowed to have our own convictions about the world. We’ve simply got to keep talking, and be open to our minds being changed. People accuse Dawkins of the same narrow thinking he diagnoses in his fundamentalist opponents, but he claims that if there was any sufficient evidence to discount evolution by natural selection or the Big Bang for that matter, he would be obliged to abandon these concepts, because that's what scientists must do. A fundamentalist, on the other hand, would dig their heels in deeper. Skeptics may have the upper-hand in this ongoing dialogue, because they are more ready to say “I was wrong” than their religious counterparts.

Homo Religiosus

Alright, so once finishing, the question remains: has Dawkins changed my mind about God? How about religion?

Dawkins covers almost every possible angle on religion, and you feel compelled to take a side. Let’s face it: religion’s track record is abysmal. And it is not just because it has been hijacked by human greed, hatred, fear and lust for power. People also do terrible things because they believe in them.

Perhaps religion should just die off, but in all honesty I think it won’t, not any time soon. However, I also think there’s still a great deal we can learn from religion, even if many of us can no longer return to its insane orthodoxies. I’ve talked about this before, but I’ll try to go into more detail about where I stand in a later post. For now I'll finish by saying I can’t agree with Dawkins, one hundred per cent, though I'm pretty close. Does this mean I am an atheist? Well, from everything I've just written it may sound like de facto atheism. This may be so, but even now the matter feels unresolved in my mind, and needs a post of its own, so I'll hold off here as well. I am far from finished with God. As far as religion is concerned, there may be ways of rethinking and reinventing it. It may take an imaginative leap not seen since the Axial Age to do it, but I still believe, however naïvely, that it is possible. If our name truly is Homo Religiosus and we are wired for religion as many anthropologists claim, this leap will have to be possible, or we may be seriously screwed as a species.

Belated Bog Post: New Years Resolutions

New Years may be SO four and a half weeks ago, but the year is still new by my books, so I think it still counts if I put my New Years resolutions up here.

By the way, it's been a very busy and eventful month, so I apologize for the absence.

My resolutions revolve mainly around the idea of Ahimsa. This term literally means 'to do no harm' in Sanskrit. I don't consider myself an aggressive or destructive person, but I have it in me to be a negative force in my life, and it's something worth striving for, even if it only means subtly changing the way I think. I mean to carry this out this year in two specific ways: Refraining from ad hominem attacks and labelling as much as possible, and giving up meat and poultry.

Ad hominem is a term used in logic and rhetoric to describe an "attempt to negate the truth of a claim by pointing out a negative characteristic or belief of the person supporting it" (Wikipedia). I heard about this term while I was working at Parliament this past summer. In Parliamentary debate, ad hominem attacks are a big no-no. (Also, did you know that if you call someone a liar in Parliament you can be fined $300?!). They had this conduct built into the rules, so important was it to civil society. I think it applies everywhere though, not just Parliament. For the purposes of doing less harm in day-to-day life, this term could be applied to our relationships with people we don't agree with. It's bound to happen, and sometimes we can't help how we feel about some encounters with people. But it's one thing to condemn a person's actions, and another to condemn the person themselves. Let's say you're in retail (like I am), and a customer is being rude to you. When they leave, you want nothing more than to verbally maul them in the company of your colleagues. "What a bitch!" you'll want to say, or "what an asshole!" This is a way of labelling that person, as if 'asshole' is what they intrinsically are, deep down in their heart of hearts, so that is what they will always be. The alternative is to say that they're simply behaving very rudely, or snobby or grouchy. No, it's not nearly as fun saying it like that, but I think it's important to make the attempt. It is a subtle shift in language that can change the way we think about our fellow human being. Or, to magnify the situation, to say "Stephen Harper is a monster" is obviously more satisfying than saying "Stephen Harper is turning Canada into a police state", but people will tend to take you more seriously with the latter phrasing, though they may agree with both statements. Many people hate what he's doing, but he is still a human being. (Besides, I think calling him 'monster' is giving him too much credit.)

Anyway, you get the point. Don't judge, be nice, walk a mile in someone else's shoes, yada-yada. That's the essence of it. But it's more feasible--empathy becomes possible--when you build this policy right into your vocabulary. I don't mean to sound all self-righteous about this. Believe me, I have no right to pontificate. Refraining from ad hominem criticisms it's not a habit I have fully achieved. My shoulder devil just relishes calling someone an idiot, a bastard, a cow, etc. I have no qualms with it when it's meant jokingly, and not behind somebody's back. But when things get serious, it seems like a worthy aspiration, which is why I've made it a resolution.

The second resolution, as I mentioned is about diet. For this year, I have given up meat and poultry. I still eat eggs and dairy, and fish on occasion. I'm going without the rest, mainly for environmental and ethical reasons, but also for the thrill of the personal challenge. It's actually a rather unambitious change I realize, and not even 100% vegetarian, but it is important to me. It's been hard enough saying goodbye to bacon and hamburgers, breakfast sausages and black forest ham etc. etc.; I'm just trying to make the transition away from animals one step at a time. I think doing it for even just a year will be worth it. I'm not exactly sure what I'll do after 2012, but I've got some time to figure that out. I have given this a lot of thought over the past few months, and I've talked it through with my lady Kayla as well. I still have plenty more research to do, but I know I'll be able to handle the change, especially now that I've become more confident with cooking (not just toast with peanut butter anymore! I'm movin' up in the world!), and I've learned more recipes for healthy dishes that don't rely on meat for protein. And the truth is, meat isn't usually my go-to for comfort food; sugar and carbs are more my Achilles' heel. Between Kayla and I we don't even eat that much meat on a daily basis anyway, so I figured I'd take it a step further for myself and make it 'official'.

The major inspiration for this project was a video I watched last April of Jonathan Safran Foer talking about his book Eating Animals. Here's the video, and if you have a half hour to spare and are concerned about the impact our eating habits have on the environment and our relationship with it, I strongly encourage you to watch it.



Anyway, I mention this because it's something I've been really excited about for a while and wanted to share it with everybody, but also for the practical reason that if I end up as a dinner guest at your house one day, you'll know this ahead of time. (You won't be able to say I didn't warn you!)

These are my two main resolutions for 2012. I share them also so that anybody reading this can hold me accountable to them.

That's all for now! See you in February!

Liam